The DPW’s Flaming Trebuchet at Burning Man 2015 was a Resto art piece which showed off our cleanup abilities. 6:37 was the time — that’s six minutes and thirty-seven seconds to clean up a flaming piano that’s been launched from a two-story slingshot and tossed splashing onto the ground like a fiery dirt clod.
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i feel fantastic
View PostMOOP Map 2016: BLM Site Inspection
View PostMOOP Map 2016: Day 9 — Sexy Mooperfluffers
View PostMOOP Map 2016: Day Seven & Eight — Resto All-Stars
MOOP Map 2016: Day Five & Six — Community Rave Zone Trips
Well, this is exhilarating: D.A. said Day Four was one of the more inspiring days Playa Restoration has ever had out here. Maybe it just felt nice to go full speed for a full day, after all those weather-filled half days.
The choreography of Line Sweeps, Special Forces, and infrastructure crews swirling towards the goal, the dirty ballet in work boots … it’s a logistical symphony to behold. We’ve had some practice this weathery week with evacuations. Now we can’t help but muster forces and move out and load up with ever more economy and efficiency.
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MOOP Map 2016: Day Four — More of Our Pieces
View PostMOOP Map 2016: Day Three — Resto vs. the Forecast
Hello from Playa Restoration, where the dust has subsided and we can finally see. As of day three, we still haven’t had a full day’s work due to a little rain, but we’re churning along quickly anyways.
To review, Day One of Resto was a three-quarters day. Day Two was a half day. Day Three was a day off due to weather, so it doesn’t count, so Day Four Is Day Three — which also ended up being a half day due to weather. Still, look what Resto got done:
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MOOP Map 2016: Day Two – Weather and Machines
A dust stairway to heaven, obviously
The wind in Gerlach howls. Howling wind is a literary cliche but what’s another term for the ‘awooo’ sound that moving air makes when it whistles around buildings and through the few trees in the streets in this town. Desert nomads in other places probably have a word for the howl wind does after a long flight across a huge expanse of flat land the size of Delaware, unencumbered by high-rises or people or even scrub brush.
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MOOP Map 2016: Day One – The Bodies and The Gears
“Killin’ time ‘til Resto.”
It’s a phrase often used in the DPW, or the Department of Public Works, Black Rock City’s builders and tearer-downers and cleaner-uppers. City superintendent Coyote likes to say we in the DPW build the first piece of art out here at Burning Man — the town grid and all the infrastructure upon it.
We build a boundary (the trash fence) and stretch a 9.5-square-mile city canvas for Burners to paint on.
As you know, all this has to disappear after Burning Man is over. Welcome to the realm of the Playa Restoration crew.
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William Binzen & John Law talk Desert Siteworks
Ever wondered why, if Burning Man was invented by punk rockers and industrial artists, the event doesn’t just look like a straight Mad Max and Tank Girl desert cosplay arena? Where did all the splashes of color on shabby-sophisticated tableaus come from?
Answer: William Binzen, Burning Man’s original visual thought leader. In the early ’90s when the Cacophony Society had their “Zone Trip” to the desert, Binzen was holed up in some nearby hot springs and expansive views, doing his own thing as well as collaborating over here on the Black Rock.
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