I love the interwebs for all that sex it constantly parades about. I’m not even talking about bad porn. I mean the openness of discussion that often surfaces. Since sex scandals and other morbid topics of abuse are flying around the news of late, I found this poetic probing (probetic ?) at the downy underbelly of sexual taboo in society and found some compelling, if distant, parallels to life on the Playa.
Why has sex become a taboo? Because it is a process of alchemy: it transforms a vast manifestation of spiritual energy, which is love, into a physical gesture.
It is imposible to understand sex as we see it nowadays - a mere response to a few physical stimuli. In reality, it is far more than that, and carries with it man’s and humanity’s entire cultural burden. Each time we face a new experience, we bring with us all past experiences - both good and bad - as well as those concepts which civilization has made into rules.
This is not right, and we must recondition the brain so that each sexual experience is unique, just as each loving experience is unique.
Very difficult… But one must try, because almost all human beings need to keep this energy in movement. So, the first thing one must understand is that it is made up of two extremes, which walk side-by-side during the entire act: relaxation and tension.
How can one set these opposite states in harmony? There is only one way: through giving oneself completely. How does one give oneself? By forgetting the traumas of the past, and by not forming expectations about the future - in other words, the orgasm. How can one do this? Very simply: by not being afraid to err.
In reality, what usually happens is that we begin a sexual relationship thinking that everything might go wrong. But even if it did, what importance would that have? One must merely be conscious of the fact that one must give one’s best, and any wrongs immediately are put right.
Once the search for pleasure is being carried out by giving oneself, with sincerity, one senses the body becoming tense, like the string of an archer’s bow, while the mind becomes more and more relaxed, like the arrow being made ready to be fired. The brain no longer governs the process, which begins to be guided by the heart. And the heart uses the five senses to show itself to the other… Read more
What struck me about this excerpt is the Playa-ness of its meaning. Notions of freely giving oneself in order to release oneself for sincerity and giving, the idea of transformation and shedding cultural burdens, the opposites are one concept of coupled relaxation and tension simultaneously, forgetting traumas and living now, in short, the grasping of wide and manifold influences and movement into a creative cumulated whole, are these ideas not the Burn encapsulated?
Would that there was more tempered abandon, sexual or otherwise, in our often repressed default world! …Or at least a wish for more drug-addled blow-out parties with E-tards and neked people running about creating things and themselves with dust in all the wrong places.
I could not agree more with the notion that our society is rabid with the self-righteous and self-fearful, liberally pointing fingers at one another while hiding behind their own denial of sex. I am tired of living among powerful children who would judge all by blind status quo double standards for no more reason really than fear or self loathing (or, more likely, to turn a buck in network ratings or votes in some campaign).
I have written a bit about Burning Man influences in the default world in the past on this blog. I’d like to add a vehement wish to invite just a touch of the open and trusting creative and sexual environment of the Playa into our often soul crushing society of self fear and hatred, not to mention the value of basic human needs like play and having fun.
In other words, I hope we can be more healthy as humans in body, mind, and spirit both on and off the Playa.
This is most exciting! The 2008 “Honorariums” (grantees) have been posted! I could quite easily spend all day (and the next) greedily perusing the entire long list. Apparently, the kind folks at Burning Man have given a higher number of 38 total grants this year (up from the usual 30 or so). Also, they received more international proposals than ever before. Looks like an amazing year for art (as well as the usual WTF!? projects) on the Playa! See below from Jack Rabbit Speaks:
ANNOUNCING … THE 2008 BURNING MAN HONORARIUM PROJECTS
The Burning Man Art Department is pleased to announce the funded projects for 2008. This year we are funding 38 projects, an increase from our usual 30 or so, as we are funding more small projects. Less than 1/3 of the projects are from the Bay Area, and we received many more proposals from abroad than ever before. We have four overseas projects this year: two from London, one from Amsterdam, and one from Wales. (Note: grants for the Man Base art installations will be announced in a future JRS.)
The funded projects are:
Altered State, by Kate Raudenbush, New York, NY (Click on New: Altered State)
Basura Sagrada, by Shrine, Tuktuk, and the Basura Sagrada Collaboratory - Pasadena, CA and Portland,
Bummer, by Myk Henry, New York, NY/Geneva, Switzerland
“Bummer” is a super size Humvee measuring 38 feet long x 18 feet wide x 16 feet high. Half of the Hummer will be painted in military khaki and the other half a bright sporty color. This sculpture epitomizes this country’s obsession with power and the Jekyll and Hyde nature of the American dream.
Celtic Forest, by Laura Kimpton, Bob Hoffman and Jeff Schomberg, Nicasio, CA
Elevation, by Michael Christian, Berkeley, CA
Elevation is a fully climbable sculpture constructed of winding tube steel ladders that elevate to a seated perch for one, on its peak. The height of the piece will be 56 feet.
Fleeble Flobbler, by Charlie Smith and Jaime Laudet, Atlanta, GA
Free Flight, by David Boyer, Reno NV
“Free Flight” is a sculpture that celebrates the ultimate freedom, the escape from the bounds of earth. Consisting of six wind-driven kinetic birds, this sculpture is in constant flux as the winds of the Black Rock grow, recede, shift and change.
Hand of Man, by Christian Ristow, Taos, New Mexico
Harmonic Geometry, by Glenn Easley and Rikk Carey, Vashon, WA
glenn.Easley at gmail.com
Popaver Rubrum Giganticum, by Gary Miller, Wyndmoor, PA
Popaver rubrum giganteum (giant red poppy) consists of three hundred 10′ tall poppies in various shades of red. The design allows for variation in the layout and placement of the individual elements.
Pswarm (PDF), by the Dept. of Spontaneous Combustion, Oakland, CA
Pyrocardium, by False Profit Labs, San Francisco, CA
Spaghetti West Ten, by the Mutoid Waste Co., London, UK
A 12′ long, by 15′ tall motorized apocalyptic horse, part beast, part rust-ravaged machine, pulls a punked-out parody of a pioneer’s covered wagon, which contains a stage for musical acts and performance.
Tantalus, by Peter Hudson, San Francisco, CA
Tantalus is Peter’s fourth large scale zoetrope. Participants must engage a laboriously intense mechanism that puts a modern spin on the myth of Tantalus while reflecting on the seemingly dwindling fruits of such labor.
The Cave, by Chassy Cleland and Henya Emmer, New York, NY
Wheel of Thwarted Ambition, by Anton Viditz-Ward, Telluride, CO
This kinetic fire sculpture represents change, rebirth and creation. Driven by a hand crank, a wheel containing buckets of burning wood is spun around, creating a ring of fire and producing lots of fireflies.
You are All so Many of Me, by Michael Emery, Santa Cruz, CA
A multitude of small cut mirrors provides the opportunity for both literal and metaphorical reflection. During the day, the viewer perceives a cubist self-portrait smiling back. At certain points during the night this reflection will be enhanced with a variety of images projected by LCD upon the mirrors. The viewer is invited to interact with images of fire and water as well as a racial/gender spectrum of other humans. The viewer is invited to contemplate, and perhaps to help create the American Dream of FREEDOM FOR ALL.
“Zsu Zsu the crybaby drama queen won’t you come play with meeee,
I built you this trailer for Burning Man so you would care for meee.”
“Zsuuu Zsu, Zsuuu Zsu… Leeeve me a geeft then go ahwey!
…Zsuuu Zsu, Zsuuu Zsu… Eetz so fuckeeng HOT.”
UPDATE - More Zsu Zsu madness
“Zsu Zsu noooo! No Zsu Zsu, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO….”
RESPECT THE ART: IF YOU DIDN’T MAKE IT, DON’T BREAK IT!!
Over the last several years, Burning Man has seen a disturbing trend growing in Black Rock City: more and more art installations are getting vandalized or damaged every year, including everything from tagging to outright destruction.
Artists work exceptionally hard to create artwork for the playa at great personal expense. Understandably, they are deeply affected when their work is destroyed or damaged … and participants who would have otherwise experienced the piece as it was intended are also affected. While some participants may see vandalism as their personal form of “radical self-expression”, ultimately, personal expression needs to be tempered by the realities of co-existing within a community, which requires mutual respect to thrive.
Please help us spread the word: if you didn’t make it, don’t break it! Help stop mindless vandalism to artwork on the playa.
Some of the artists tell their stories below, in a letter to our community from Kate Raudenbush, who created the Guardian of Eden last year. We reprint them for you here, in the hopes that their words speak more persuasively than any missive we could craft. We know that most JRS readers are unlikely to be the culprits of vandalism; we hope you will help by taking time to share in watching out for the artwork in our city.
CNet News offers up news on the upcoming alternative fuels only (and acquired sans moneys) race from Berkeley to Vegas on July 4th weekend. This should definitely push the limits of a burgeoning fossil-less fuel transportation industry… I hope… It’s like Road Warrior but fighting for coffee grounds and chicken poop instead of gasoline, but is in the desert, while ending up in the bizarre casino/marriage town of Vegas, not the dystopian out back.
“…NASA scientists and junkyard fabricators once again square off in the perennial battle of engineering prowess and creative excess, this time with bragging rights for saving-the-world somewhat hanging in the balance,” wrote Escape from Berkeley organizer Jim Mason in an e-mail announcing the new race. “Where DARPA had the Grand Challenge, the rednecks the Cannonball Run, the truckers a Convoy, and the hippies a bunch of WVO buses broken down on the side of the road, now the collected geek tribes propose to start their ‘engines’ on something other than a petroleum-based fuel, and cause their varied schemes for land-based transport to not be in Berkeley, and somehow, by some means, show up in Las Vegas three days later, using only fuels/power/motive force scavenged ‘for free’ along the route.”
A commitment to purposeful self expression unrestricted by commercial dictates or social norms.
A radical sense of participation and self-reliance that recognizes we must catalyze the change we seek.
An acknowledgment that principles can also be questions. To start just with one: What might be possible when this community’s collective energy is translated into the world beyond Black Rock City?
Uh oh, now I can pretend I’m in BRC all day everyday. All I have to do is play really bad psytrance on multiple conflicting-beat stereos in other parts of my house on high volume with too much muddy bass to replicate that zesty sonic flavor of the Playa chaos!
Grand opening celebration party, spin-jam & playa costume burner social.
Friday, February 22nd. 6PM-9PM
Santa Rosa Junior College - 1501 Mendocino Ave. - Santa Rosa
DJS - COSTUMES - FIRE DANCERS - FIRE SCULPTURES - LIGHT ART - INFLATABLES - SHENANIGANS (Some outdoor features of the event are weather permitting)
There will also be an afternoon reception on Thursday, February 21st, 4-6. Everyone is invited to both of these events!
The show runs February 22nd-March 22nd.
The gallery is a beautiful space on the ground floor of the new Doyle
Library Building on the SRJC campus.
The gallery hours are Tues-Friday, 10-4, Sat noon-4
CALL TO ACTION! HELP MAKE THE OPENING PARTY AMAZING! FIRE DANCERS - DJ’S - PERFORMANCE ARTISTS - ART CARS - SOUND ENGINEERS… THIS MEANS YOU!
Are you a firedancer? Would you like to perform at the event? Do you have costumes or an Artcar that lights up? We hope you’ll bring them! Please contact Lisa & Tony at Lisabee@sonic.net, or Zack Darling at northbay@burningman.com for more info.
I love the interwebs for all that sex it constantly parades about. I’m not even talking about bad porn. I mean the openness of discussion that often surfaces. Since sex scandals and other morbid topics of abuse are flying around the news of late, I found this poetic probing (probetic ?) at the downy underbelly of sexual taboo in society and found some compelling, if distant, parallels to life on the Playa.
