A People’s History of Burning Man - Volume 2

Back by popular demand, more stories from Burning Man's oral
history project, an ambitious endeavor to track down and talk
with people who helped shape the culture as we now know it.


Stuart and Andie remember to remember the most memorable parts.
Here’s a fresh batch:


Chris Radcliffe, artist, con artist, prankster, and shadow
founder of Burning Man (perhaps), shares stories of how the
Cacophony Society would prank the media and how the Black Rock
Desert drove up his fears, then dispelled them. He also hints at
the larger-than-life impact of the Billboard Liberation Front.

Candace Locklear, aka Evil Pippi, a perturber and social
experimenteer (new word) shares how she helped Burning Man manage
the mainstream media in the late ‘90s. She also talks about
cutesy culture jamming as a scary clown.

Summer Burkes was the DPW's media liaison. She sees the early
days of Black Rock City as the love child of comically aggressive
punk rockers and air-kissy techno industrialists, and she
embraces their uneasy peace.

Steve Heck brought 88 pianos to Burning Man in 1996, stacked
them in a tall circular “piano bell.” People beat it into a
cacophonous soundscape until he burned it. That was after he
almost died wandering the desert. Then he cleaned it up, and did
it the next year, and the next year, and taught the BRC teams the
art of packing and moving big stuff.

Dr. Hal Robins is a beloved Renaissance Man of stage and
story, a Cacophonist, an Uber Pope of the Church of the
Subgenius, and a mellifluous philosopher of sesquipedalians.
He shares about the inventiveness and serendipity of Burning Man
and why it matters in the world.



Part 1 of this series:
burningman.org/podcast/a-peoples-history-of-burning-man


journal.burningman.org/category/philosophical-center


burningman.org/programs/philosophical-center


www.cacophony.org


The What Where When Guide is here.


The 1996 Helco commercial is here.


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