JRS VOLUME #7; ISSUE #17
JRS/7.17/02.20.03
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Here’s the rest of that JRS that we promised on Monday, burners. We hope a little news from home can offer a bit of warmth to all of you out there who are growing impatient with your wait for spring. Maybe you can take solace in the fact that there are only 185 days until we burn the Man (which might seem unbelievable to those of you who are huddled into parkas these days.) Hang in there – the desert awaits!
Read on for some news, announcements, and a delightful follow up report from Seattle about their “Meet and Greet and Clean and Sweep” event.
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BLACK ROCK CITY NEWS:
**BURNING MAN: GONE POLITICAL?**
**BMAN PROJECT STAFFERS ON KPFA**
**JUDGE JOE BROWN: VERDICT**
PARTICIPATE:
**VOLUNTEER QUESTIONNAIRE IS BACK**
**HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WHALE?**
**BURNER SEX SURVEY**
EVENTS AND HAPPENINGS:
**”CONFESSIONS OF A BURNING MAN” SCREENING AT CINEQUEST**
**SEATTLE: TROLL REPORT**
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***********BLACK ROCK CITY NEWS**********
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IS BURNING MAN GOING POLITICAL? A response to last week’s JRS
After we sent JRS V7-15, we got a number of responses to our having sent a link to an act of self-expression by burner Wendy Tremayne in NYC, who expressed her views in Central Park by spelling out “NO WAR” with the bodies of her naked friends.
While Burning Man was not taking a position on any particular political issue by highlighting Wendy’s act, there were responses both for and against our having included this post. It seems that you all believe, as we do, that Burning Man should remain relatively apolitical, keeping itself only to those issues that directly impact the viability of the event.
We respect and encourage both points of view on this issue to express themselves creatively. The point of the post, really, was to highlight that burners were doing something expressive, artistic, and participatory. We really weren’t trying to express a position one way or the other, and in fact we seriously edited the post to remove any tone that expressed such an endorsement.
We know it’s dicey territory, but we want to encourage burners who are expressing themselves, whatever it is.
We do apologize if the post offended anyone, and will continue to purposely endeavor to restrain ourselves in the future.
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BURNING MAN PROJECT STAFFERS ON KPFA
Sunday FEB 23, 2003, 7 to 8 pm.
SF East Bay radio station KPFA 94.1FM
– stream to the web at kpfa.org
Tune in this Sunday as Burning Man Project staffers join Jane Heaven (The Voluptuarie, Hushville, BM 2002) as she hosts an hour of radio in celebration of the almost indescribable Burning Man experience. featuring Community Services’ Harley Dubois, the DPW’s Will Roger, Holly Kreuter (Community Services and producer of the book “Drama in the Desert”) along with astrologer/burner Rob Breszny, who will read from his Burning Man journals, plus other guests. Behind in the mix is the pulse of live-in-the-studio musicians trading off and featuring Matt Venuti (Venusians/ chief instigator), Vivianna Guzman and her 50 flutes, the Monkey Business percussion ensemble (Hanuman Surah).
Listen in on the radio if you’re within range, or on the internet!
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JUDGE JOE BROWN: VERDICT
If you’re curious how things turned out for Phat Man Dee and Tommy Amoeba and their burnt pink elephant (JRS V7-14, “Burning Man in the Media”) you can read one reporter’s POV at post-gazette.com…
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VOLUNTEER QUESTIONNAIRE IS BACK
Many burners have tried within the past month to fill out Burning Man’s Volunteer Questionnaire, and a great number of you were met with errors as the database underwent some growing pains.
Well, the bugs all seem to be worked out, so if you’ve tried complete the questionnaire and received any error message, we apologize, and invite you to please try it one more time.
Find your burning niche at: Volunteer Questionnaire.
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HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WHALE?
Does anyone out there have an image of Balaena Delubrum, the el-wire whale which appeared to leap out of the playa at Burning Man 2002? It was a sequenced el-wire animation out in the deep playa, and very tricky to photograph. We have an image of it here:
image=10008 but would love to find one of the whale in mid-air in complete darkness. If you have such a shot please contact ladybee(at)burningman(dot)com.
Thanks!
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BURNER SEX SURVEY (HEY, IT’S ACADEMIC)
A burner writes:
“I have been to the past 5 events and am sad to say I am taking the year off. Part of the reason is my school. I am working towards a Ph.D. in Sexology at the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality. If you are curious about the school, the homepage is here: iashs.edu
As part of my degree requirement, I have to do a research project where I collect the Institute’s Basic Sex Profile from 100 individuals from a particular group. And of course one of the most fascinating groups ever is Burners. The questionnaire is a general survey of a person’s sexuality, sort of along the lines of the Kinsey Reports that you might have heard of from the 1950s. The questionnaire is meant to be completed in an anonymous fashion so as to encourage complete honesty.
This is not a commercial exercise nor do I plan to make money from this in some way.
The homepage is sexpositiveuniverse.com
{JRS Note: if you prefer to fill out this survey on paper and mail it in, information is on this page.}
The link to the Burning Man survey is
Burning.Man.Sex.Profile.htm
(PS Want to help even more? There’s another survey at
Genital.Herpes.Sex.Profile.htm).”
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**********EVENTS AND HAPPENINGS********
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“CONFESSIONS OF A BURNING MAN” SCREENING AT CINEQUEST
CONFESSIONS OF A BURNING MAN is a documentary/art movie that will make its debut at the Cinequest San Jose Film Festival on Friday, March 7.
Commemorating the CONFESSIONS OF A BURNING MAN screenings, Camp Confessions is hosting a free event to which all burners are invited:
Friday, March 7th, 7:00 pm
Cinequest evening with Larry Harvey and the filmmakers
Barnes & Noble Bookstore
Pruneyard Shopping Center
Campbell, CA
CONFESSIONS OF A BURNING MAN Screenings
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The screenings will include appearances by the filmmakers and people featured in the stories. Show times and tickets are available on the Cinequest web site provided below. The Cinequest screenings often sell out in advance, and purchasing tickets early is highly recommended.
For show times, venues and tickets, please link to:
Confessions_Of_A_Burning_Man
For more information about the film, “Confessions of a Burning Man,” visit burningmanconfessions.com
Friday, March 7th, 11:30 pm
San Jose Repertory Theatre
101 Paseo de San Antonio
San Jose, CA
Saturday, March 8th, 11:45 pm
Camera 3 Theater
South Second Street and San Carlos
San Jose, CA
{JRS NOTE: The Jack Rabbit hears rumors that the “Confessions” crew may be planning a fun “street festival” type event prior to the screening on March 7th. We’ll be sure to give you the full skinny as we hear more details, so stay tuned!}
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TROLL REPORT
From the inimitable Wally Glenn, a report on the Seattle “Meet and Greet and Clean and Sweep” last weekend (the JRS can’t begin to express how our hearts swell when we say that…)
“Last Saturday, February 1st, the Seattle Burning Man Community organized a Meet and Greet at the Fremont Troll. The idea was to have people do a little work cleaning the area around the Troll and socialize. Over 30 people showed up and did an impressive job of cleaning and socializing. Included were members of the Fremont Arts Council, Sea Rangers and members of the Seattle Burning Man community.
The Troll was swept, and a leaf blower blew off the top and around the recesses of his body. Sonia Telesco performed some minor surgery to his hand. Others helped shovel soil where it had eroded over sidewalks and around the sides of the Troll and the stairs leading up to the Aurora Bridge. Much sweeping was done and pulling of blackberry vines around the stairs to keep them clean and accessible. People also cleaned the park on the side of the Troll and removed trash and a small cache of soy milk dated back in the year 2000.
Special thanks to Ivan Cockrum and Rebecca Firestone who showed up with treats and after some finagling with a propane stove, Wally Glenn was able to serve hot spiced apple cider. Marianne and Ranger Ziptie showed up with very tasty vegan doughnuts.
Special thanks to Yuba Foxfire who carted away all of the trash for proper disposal and to David and Carol Peterman who promoted the event on the Seattle regional web site, at burningmanseattle.com.
The Troll is Popular: We also noticed a steady stream of visitors who stopped by to visit the Troll. About one party showed up every 5 minutes to see the Troll. Some just viewed from a car, others took a picture, some got out for a group photo and others climbed around. Everyone who got out of their cars was very happy to see a community coming out and cleaning up such a well loved icon of Seattle.
One man asked if the Troll was demonic. We talked to him a bit and pointed out that in fairy tales, Trolls live under a bridge, so what better public art to go under one of Seattle’s most popular bridges? He happened to be reading a story that talks of a one-eyed huge monster that looked like the Troll. We pointed out that the Troll actually looks quite a bit like one of the artists that was responsible for its creation, and that any other likeness is purely coincidental. He seemed very happy to know that the artwork was not intended to be evil and that kids seemed to love crawling over it, so it must have a good heart. Since he has a good opinion of the artwork, I decided it was best not to mention the body in the Volkswagen. Some trivia is best left unmentioned.
Future Plans: We also sent an investigative committee to check out the Bridge Street Mural. We have drafted plans on the best way to do some extensive repainting to cover up graffiti that has tagged the mural. Michael “Spike” Thomas is going to go to Daly’s Paint to borrow a color wheel and begin to match colors used in the mural so we can fix areas that are badly tagged.
We also noticed that there are several areas around the Troll which are suffering from erosion. This is due to a leaking expansion joint on the bridge and traffic areas from people climbing on the Troll. Some of the terrace steps are loose and should be rebuilt. Some extra steps could be added to help control the erosion and to provide better steps up to the head.
The general consensus is that people would love to come out and do some more work, so we plan on staging a terrerace party (sic intended) to make some minor improvements and to do touch-up on the Bridge Street Mural sometime in March. Rodman Miller is looking into the idea of creating some more artistic retaining walls.
How to arrange a similar event:
My best advice is to get several friends together who will come out with you to do a community project, then announce the project. This way you have a built-in base of people who will be there no matter what. Be friendly and accommodating to those that do show up and help. Some people are willing to help but if they feel left out, it will leave them with a bad experience. The idea is to inspire people to come to a community project and bring their friends. Or better yet, organize their own community level project. No project is too small. Even of the project is walking the beach because you want to walk the beach. Take a few trash bags and suddenly, you have all the things you need to do something that does benefit the community, and you’ll have a good time as well.
Have a lovely day
Wally Glenn
Mayor of Planet Wally
gwally.com
arfarfarf.com”
NICE WORK, Seattle!
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