| It
is rather hard to
tell someone what Burning Man is all about or what
it means personally. So much depends on what you bring to the
event and your mindset while there. If you want to know more
try Burningman.com Burning Man Stories: 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 |
| The
BORG2 was created in response to a petition and bet made to Larry
Harvey by Jim Mason and Chicken John, late fall of 2004. Other
veteran Burners agreed; we felt that the participants of the event
should have more say in what art is funded. A system for voting
was developed and instigated. At the beginning of 2005 Burners
and interested people came together to vote in an, ‘Art
Council’ and ‘Guest Curators’. This was done via the
Internet with secure and transparent systems. From this, a
volunteer council was elected to steer the experiment. This group of
people from all over the USA quickly set about raising funds and
developing systems to proceed with the overall goal of bringing more
art to Burning Man 2005 by gathering public funds and having the public
decide how its spent. Events were thrown and money came in.
Ballots were cast and more money was raised. The final voting was
accomplished by the same on-line system, and the funds were distributed
to the artists. The BORG2 also worked to network the artists with
resources, space and transportation to and from the event. All
Eight funded artists got their work to the event but several had
unplanned difficulties. Many people were inspired and brought
their art to BM05 in the name of the BORG2 without funding, the feeling
of community was expanded and everyone benefited from our cooperative
spirit and efforts. The DPW and Artery seemed very pleased with
our efforts, and gave us thumbs up on our sites. We had some
media coverage though-out the experiment and attempted to document our
processes as best we could. We came far short of the bet’s goal; $250,000, (we raised little more than $25,000) so we lost, (and CJ got dunked at Decompression) but since it was never about the $, and all about the vote. The BORG2 and everyone who participated and experiences the art that was created wins, as well as Burning Man, for it is our gift. Why should Burning Man instigate a vote on the granted art at the event? This will give the greater Burning Man community a chance to participate in a large part of the festival. It will also encourage the community to support artists it likes and attendees to get together and be involved in projects during the other parts of the year. It will provide opportunities for participants to feel some ownership of what is happening with the event they so dearly love. And hopefully inspire them to bring the festival home and make the regional burns occur with more frequency and enthusiasm. Things the project will have to do for this to work: Settle on a $ amount that will be voted on. Formulate guidelines for what will be grantable by vote. Decide who is eligible to vote * Have Lady Bee and the Artery work with a small group from the public to facilitate the application processing and review. ** Set up an area on the BM website for voting and to show proposed work or links to it. Credit Kiko for his voting program if it is used Time frame for voting: Alert public to vote, and start public education about voting. Open registration to community * Call for curators or volunteers ** Vote on Curators or establish volunteer team Announce theme, call for entries with vote in mind Receive applications Have review of submitted proposals by BM and Curators Present reviewed work to public with notes made by Curators Have public vote Start grant payment process and contract cycle Present wonderful art at BM Once the amount of $ that will be dispersed has been decided, a public vote on a fixed amount using a shopping cart style works well. This caused the voter to have to think about the cost and value of the art out there. Budgeted $ for the vote does not need to be the entire BM art budget, the project can still grant the art it sees fit and still has the final say on funding. *Voters, might be enrolled by several ways; it could be open to anyone interested or to registered ticket buyers, this would be done on the BM website and tracked with e-mail. **This may not be necessary if Lady Bee and the Artery feel they can handle the extra work that review of this style will involve. The criteria for an acceptable proposal will be based on reasonable budget and practicality of installation. Not its artistic theme, statement or nature. But some type of systematic explanation of the projects and their components will have to be done, with intent to give the voters a consistent overview of the candidates. This is where the Curators would be useful. They could facilitate this process, by developing its parameters, then applying them to inform the public. Summary: In the last year the BORG2 faced many challenges; public education, fundraising, creating systems for the many aspects of the granting, and personality conflicts, just to name a few. This experiment was no easy task and caused many people to become disheartened during the trial. But various brave souls continued to labor towards our goal and through their hard work and perseverance we were triumphant in accomplishing it. We were able to take a bitchy proclamation and turn it into something positive and creative. We developed a solution to a perceived problem and followed it through to its successful conclusion. The community was involved and its input was a factor on how it developed. Yes it was a ‘Do-ocracy‘ and members rose to the challenges and overcame them. Yes it was slow and painful at times but overall the experience was very positive as it gives insight to how a community can make decisions for itself and good ones at that. The BORG2 spent much energy on aspects that are unnecessary for the project, such as nonprofit status and fundraising, I am focusing this document on what I think is important for the BRC LLC, and BM community. Comments/FAQ’s: Q: It is to hard for the average attendant to understand what it takes to achieve a successful installation at BM. A: Joe Burner does not need to, the Curators will screen out the bad ones, the public will only be shown eligible choices. Additionally, reviews by the Curators will help level the playing field while educating the voters. Q: If some grant applications websites look better than others or the artist is fashionable, it will be unfair to those less net savvy, or exposed. A: It already is, this is just the way it works. Using the Internet to advertise yourself is becoming the standard way to gain support off playa. Someone who has the ability to attract/hire assistance, has a better chance of pulling off a grant worthy project. It sets the bar higher, keeps the quality up and the flake-factor down. If an artist communicates his or her message well they should be rewarded. Q: What if the public picks poorly or chooses based on name recognition. A: Then we will know that this system does not work and needs improvement, either by educating the voters or changing the method of presentation. Q: It will just be popularity contest, and people will get voters to blindly make decisions, or someone will jack the system and flood it with votes. A: We found that not to be true, people with lots of name recognition did no better than the unknowns, others advertised heavily and did not fair well. No one cares that much to make it worth the time to scam votes and we had systems in place to prevent it. |