BurnWorks Art Opening at Prana

We had our first art opening tonight at Prana. What a great night! Thanks for coming out and seeing our work. Everything that we make is 100% custom and recycled. If you are interested in a custom design, contact us at: burnworks AT gmail DOT com.

Happy Thursday Art Show - Friday, Nov. 5th

Come celebrate the art and spirit of Boulder's cruiser culture! Featuring traditional black and white cruiser photography by Tracy Kosinski and bike art by Del Kreiser and Brad Holland.

Photo exhibit will be up throughout the month of November.

Wine/beer/snacks provided by Prana.

Friday, November 5 · 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Prana on Broadway and Pearl in Boulder

1147 Pearl Street

Whoa, where have we been?

Hello out there in the Interwebs. Sorry for the long delay in postings, we have been busy with lots of events and life in general. We will be posting some news shortly.

Day 4: Public Relations and touch-feely conflict resolution

Saturday's sessions have been hit and a little miss for me. The morning key note speaker was a fellow by the name of King George from Australia. The King discussed the evolution of the Australia Burn and the thoughtful preparation that will allow the event the grow with ease and instill the 10 principles in every participant.

Next up was Public Relations 101. How to work with the media, press releases, interviews, sound bites, when the shit hits the fan, etc. It was probably one of the best discussions for me and I found it very informational. There were a lot of takeaways that I will be using once I get back to the Bubble.

Side note: the food throughout the Summit has been great. Vegetarian and mostly vegan. Steve and Dawn would be proud.

After lunch was a group discussion on conflict resolution. I thought this was going to be tips and tricks on how to diffuse situations when there is disagreement. BMHQ hired a couple that do conflict improv and it devolved into touch-feely exercises in breathing and feeling the space around you and to "honor your life" and "connect with people around you". I guess it is the east coaster in me, but this had me feeling a little uncomfortable, but I was willing to go along with it. Takeaways: body language, gauging what you say and working to get a "yes".

Next: Day 4: BurningSNOW Center and Transparency

Burning Life

I wanted to spend a little time talking about a project that Danger Ranger is involved in. It is called "Burning Life".

What is Burning Life?

"Burning Life is a festival of community, art and fire in the virtual world of Second Life. It was first held in 2003 when the Second Life grid was still in it's infancy, and it's inspired by the real life Art, Fire and Community festival known globally as Burning Man. Both Burning Man and Second Life began in San Francisco, California. But they have a lot more in common than their birthplace...."

Second Life is an immersive virtual world where players can create avatars and become whoever they want and meet new and interesting people. Sound familiar? The people at Linden Labs, the creators of Second Life, wanted to make a Burning Man event in this virtual world. After receiving the blessings from BMHQ, an effigy was burned. Burning Life is now in it's 7th year.

Why would someone want to play Burning Life instead of going to the real Burn? It could be logistics, economy or even disability. Burning Life now has over 25,000 participants that "attend" ever year. That is half of the population that actually goes to Black Rock City!

I met up with Danger Ranger and asked him what he is working on at the moment and he said Burning Life. "So how are you 'using' this?" Danger created the Black Rock City Rangers, a volunteer team of people that work as liaisons between participants and the authorities. They help diffuse situations, answer questions, assist people in need and more. Volunteers must attend training sessions to become a Ranger and that might require flying/driving to another state due to a Ranger contact not being in their geographic area. Burning Life could help solve this by hosting training sessions within Second Life. Burning Man staff/rangers could put would-be rangers in situations that they have to work through based on their training. Danger said that by the end of the training online, a person could actually go to Black Rock City or a regional event and successfully work as a Ranger.

As nerdy as this all sounds, I think it is amazing that people are doing this in a virtual environment. Maybe this will help bring about the Singularity, but for the time being, it is allowing more people to experience Burning Man.

Day 3: The Convection Caucus

[After the Urban Safari I went on a personal business expedition to My Dutch Bike to see how their shop is set up and the types of bikes they had. Pretty cool, but the shop was empty. They had a lot of window lookie loos, but no one brave enough to walk in. Hmmm... is Boulder ready for dutch cargo bikes? I will find out in 2010, but that is another story for another day.]

Over to the Convection Caucus. In the main hall of the Bentley Reserve, Burning Man departments and art projects set up convention booths were the visiting delegates could connect and learn more about departments such as: DPW, BM Lawyers, Regional Ticketing, BRAF, Accounting, Info Booth, Special Events, Tech Team, BMIR, Burners without Borders, Black Rock Rangers, Burning Blog, Earth Guardians, and a whole lot more. There were booths for: NIMBY, The Box Shop, Flaming Lotus Girls, Kostume Kult, Kidsville, Burning Man Opera, etc. The great thing was to hear their stories, how they got started and what they continue to face in their respective communities. A lot of it sounded exactly what the BurnWorks and the Phoenix Asylum have been trying to do for the last 2-3 years. We are not alone. Inspiring.

There were break-out groups that Regionals could attend throughout the Caucus. I went to "How to run an effective meeting" and "Thinking outside of the Bar". The latter meeting was interesting to hear how the regional rep directly worked with the local government to throw small events and how she now has (pretty much) the full support for any event she wants to put on. Proper planning, documentation will help get your event approved. Or will it?

As I sat there listening to this, it made me think about the events that Boulder Burners and creatives throw: Second Friday Art Openings, The Cruiser Ride, The Big Wheel Rally, PirateCon, SantaCon, Kinetics, Naked Pumpkin Run, World Naked Bike Ride and others. Could those event organizers put them on with the blessing of the city? Most of them no. The Kinetics Race had a really long run, but finally closed under the mounting costs, declining attendance and lack of a corporate sponsor. The Cruiser Ride continues to ride a razors edge of being shut down or the city turning a blind eye to the organized chaos that it has become. The Big Wheel Rally has the best shot at becoming approved. Will the costs of permits, insurance and potentially police escorts shut it down or hurt the fund raising efforts? Is it better to beg forgiveness or ask permission? Should certain events/activities become headless so the city cannot single any one person out? Going legit or remaining an outlaw? Maybe certain events are best left underground while others should come up for air and work with the city? Lots to think about.

The Caucus ended with a talk by Larry Harvey, the founder of Burning Man. The main hall filled with area Burners to hear Larry since he hasn't spoken at a large event in about 4 years. Larry talked about the origin of the "9 principles" and then adding the 10th principle, Immediacy. He also discussed the amazing programs that were born out of the Burn: Burners without Borders, Black Rock Solar and the Xara Learning Village Charter School. Burning Man has influenced communities throughout the world and "creates Social Equity" and Larry posits the world will change again when there is another large Burning Man-style event in Europe or Asia. I can't wait to see it.

Next: Burning Life
 

Day 3: Urban Safari Tour

Ah, rise and shine and heading back to the Bentley Reserve for the morning art tour. We went on an Urban Safari Tour led by Danger ASS to various public art spaces around the Tender(groin), Castro, and beyond. Being a safari, we had pith helmets and animal print fleece blankets to keep us warm. After a warm up of singing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," we were off. Danger-ASS took us to the Defenestration Building. The art piece is an unoccupied building with furniture leaping out of the windows. It was meant to be up for a year, but has been there for 13. It brought art to the Tenderloin and said, "hey, this area can have art too!". Unfortunately it is in need of major repairs and restoration to fix it up. Check out the link. It was pretty cool.

Next up was Dan das Mann and Karen Cusolito's metal sculpture, Ecstacy. If you were at the Burn in 2007, you saw this sculpture at the Ground Awakening installation. The sculpture is now installed at Patricia's Green in the Hayes Valley neighborhood. All made from recycled scrap metal. It is pretty amazing to look at and it will be on display until sometime this summer.

From there we continued our tour to various murals, public gardens and a general history lesson of San Francisco and new projects that are helping to beautify the city. It would be great to get more art into Boulder supported by the city. I think Boulder Burners should be working on this. Community-supported, city-sponsored art throughout the city.

Next: Day 3: Convection Caucus

Day Two: Registration and Regional Mixer

After my excursion around San Francisco, I headed over to the Bentley Reserve convention center for registration. Volunteers check me in and gave me my conference material and badge. I am now an official "Community Leader". What does that mean exactly? When did I become a leader? *Gulp*

As regionals started coming in, I did the proper Burner thing to do and introduce myself with an awkward hand shake then a more comfortable hug. Everyman from Ohio, Andi from Hawaii and a whole bunch of Canucks. The Regional Mixer wasn't until 7:00 so we decided to head directly to the bar and keep the seats warm for everyone.

Alright, it is finally 7:00pm and people are flowing in. ActionGirl, Danger Ranger and a veritable who's who of Burning Man staff and volunteers came in. It was great to sit down with the other Regionals and Community Leaders and hear about what they are doing in their neck of the woods. The two Burns in Ohio, the difficulty of Ka Pilina trying to find land after a 1 year hiatus. So close, but not quite there. The Canadian Burns and their even bigger Decompression.

It was interesting to see how everyone interacted and introduced themselves. Usually the first question in any conversation starts with, "So, what do you do?", here it is replaced with, "So, how many Burns have you been to?" People are genuinely interested in what you are doing in your Community and that is awesome.

The evening/morning ended with a midnight showing of Alice in Wonderland. The Burners took over the theater led by Maid Marian and $Teven Ra$pa. From what I remember the movie was good.

Next: Day 3: Art Tour

San Francisco: Day Two

So my first full day in San Francisco was mostly spent sight seeing and enjoying the sunny weather. I can see why people love it here. Beautiful scenery, buildings, the diversity of the people, culture, music, arts, etc.

I was lucky enough to have a bicycle to explore the city with and the weather was excellent.

Next post: Registration and Regional mixer

Cultural adventure in SF: day 1

This after school community center for wayward girls is a great thing
for a city to have.

On my way

Even with the "threat" level at Orange, I was able to make it to DIA
without an evildoer in sight. Phew!

Meeting up with Nelz tonight at a bar called "Amsterdam". Hhhmmmm?

Tomorrow I will explore San Francisco by bike and then head to
registration at the Bentley Reserve. BM HQ has a lot planned for us
this week so the candle will be lit from both ends.

Burning Man Summit - SF bound

BurnWorks Liveblogging (March 3-7)

I (Del) will be heading to San Francisco as the official Boulder emissary for the 2010 Burning Man Regional Leadership Summit. If you have any questions that need answered by Burning Man HQ, I will take those with me and see what I can find out. It could be questions regarding: Art Grants, events, Apogaea, etc. Let me know.

I will also be "liveblogging" and posting updates to www.burnworks.org throughout the event. I am really excited to go out there and represent Boulder and let the rest of the BM world know that we are doing a lot in Colorado.

More to come...

BurnWorks in 2010

Hello there,

Things have been a little quiet at the 'Works this winter, but we will begin ramping up with some fun projects, community activities and general mayhem this spring and summer.

What have we been working on?

Brad:

- Metal jewelry trees
- Snowboard furniture
- Brad recently sold his bicycle rim chair in a silent auction at BMOCA. Way to go.

Del:

- The "Junkfiets" project is reaching an end will soon make its way to the powdercoater. This will be my main form of transportation this year and to test the viability of a cargo bike market in Boulder. I think this town is ready.

- I am currently working on a business sign for two great businesses, iSupportU (www.isupportu.biz) and Boulder Community Computers (www.bococo.org). Shaun and Eric were looking to incorporate elements from both of their businesses: computers and bicycles and create something that captures what they are all about. The sign will be unveiled at their open house on April 1, 2010.


Brad and Del will both be working to help get the Phoenix Asylum up to code so we can continue our work in creating a new arts district in Boulder. Learn how you can help the Asylum at: www.phoenixasylum.com.

The BurnWorks patio will be going through more beautification upgrades this year. Check back to find out when you can come by and help us make the Patio an oasis in the Lower East Side.