Burning Art & Experience

What is the essence of the Burn? Or to look at it another way, what element of the Burn - if we took it away - would make it cease to be a Burn? I'd argue that it's art. Yet talking about the Burning Art and reproducing images of the Art that exists inside and around the Burn space presents a difficulty.

The ambition for this Burning Wiki is to record and present the different ways that Burns are expressed and experienced around the World. Burning Art is not only contextual within the Burn, but also within the cultures that inspire and create the Burn. There's a legitimate sense that reproducing Burning Art 'outside the Burn' invalidates it. On the other hand, it's the Art of the Burn that has had the deepest impact upon the wider world. Millions of people know of the Burn through images of the Art at the Burn, even if they know almost nothing else about the Burn. And perhaps that points the way forward for the Burning Wiki.

If we have an ambition to change the World, to tilt its axis even so slightly in the direction of a better future, then we can't hope to do that by bringing everyone to the Burn. We have to bring the Burn to the World. Sharing the imagery of the Burn, which already has an keen audience, is a chance to share the philosophy and sentiment of the Burn. If we can present the Art, with honesty and sensitivity, in its total context, then I believe we are respecting it, and the artists and Burn communities who have brought it to life.

This Burning Wiki is not going to the agent of that change. But it might hope to be a tool that is useful to those who hope to be. The first of many projects in this space will be to collect the maps of all the Burns. These are the marks we make upon the Earth, and also a chance to consider the mark that the Earth leaves upon us.