Burning Man survived a muddy quagmire — Will the experiment last 30 more years?
nypost.comBurning Man’s surrealistic circus, fueled by acts of kindness and avant-garde theatrics, sometimes with a dose of hallucinogens or nudity.
The spectacle flourished as the festival ballooned over the next three decades.Some say it grew too much, too fast.Things came to a head in 2011 when tickets sold out for the first time.
Organizers responded with a short-lived lottery system that left people out of what was supposed to be a radically inclusive event.
As Burning Man matured, luxurious accommodations proliferated, as did the population of billionaires and celebrities.Katherine Chen, a sociology professor in New York City who wrote a 2009 book about the event’s “creative chaos,” was among those who wondered whether Burning Man “would be a victim of its own success.”Exponential growth led to increasing questions about whether organizers had veered too far from the core principles of radical inclusion, expression, participation and the pledge to “leave no trace.”That last hurdle was never harder to clear than this year as “Burners” tried to leave over Labor Day weekend after torching the 80-foot (24-meter) wooden sculpture that is “the Man.”A rare rainstorm turned the Black Rock Desert into a muddy quagmire 110 miles (175 kilometers) north of Reno, delaying the departure of 80,000 revelers.
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