Build something. Burn it.
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The Effigy at Alchemy 2019, design by Ernest Law
Tomorrow I will build a thing, and tomorrow night I will burn it.
Here’s why.
While I am a committed burner here in Georgia, I have never been to Burning Man itself. I might have when I was first interested, six years ago, but now… it’s expensive, the terrain is rough, I’m old, etc etc etc all the chicken reasons. Besides, this year there is no Burning Man. There are no burns. We’re stuck at home.
Here, of course, I’m spearheading the fictitious AlterAlchemy, which is just the placement map; however that ends up, the hippies can play with it as if it were real. Burning Man, being much larger and much richer, is having a worldwide virtual burn.
Tomorrow night, which would have been burn night at TTID**, anyone who wishes can build their own Man (aka “the Effigy” at Alchemy) and burn it as part of a worldwide burn. Literally: it begins at the International Date Line and goes around the globe as people livestream their burns.
And so tomorrow I will cobble together a small architectural structure of some kind — I have no firm ideas of what it will look like as of this moment — and tomorrow night I will place it in my fire pit and watch it burn.
The Effigy at Alchemy 2019, mid-burn / photo credit Justin Majors
Why? Why would anyone put the time, effort, and materials into building an effigy, even a miniature one, and then watch it go up in flames? And for the big guys like Burning Man or Alchemy or Transformus — that time, effort, and materials is sizable. Why?
It’s an important, beautiful RITUAL, that’s why. (Remember that RITUAL is an action that is designed to move the participant into a separate space, away from the everyday.)
When we watch the Effigy go up in flames at Alchemy, we’re watching the very symbol of our burn, our temporary community, vanish. It has stood as the largest structure at the burn for the entire week. We’ve climbed on it, written our thoughts/prayers/wishes/curses on it, lived around it.***
No matter the multiplicity of our experiences during the week, on Saturday night when we gather around the Effigy, we gather as a community. As it burns, we think of that community and what we’ve shared together all week, and once it’s reduced to a bonfire many will run or walk around it howling in… celebration? Grief? Release? Yes.
When we awaken on Sunday morning, it’s gone. Where it stood is a burn scar, already being cleaned up by the teardown crew. We pack our tents and our art and we go home. In many ways, the Effigy burn is the Breaking of the Circle of the larger RITUAL of the burn itself. It is a reminder of the deliberate impermanence of our Temporary Autonomous Zone.
So build something, preferably with others. And then burn it, preferably with others. Celebrate it, destroy it, let it go. Create your RITUAL.
** TTID = That Thing In the Desert
*** If you look at the photo of the Effigy burning, you can see a small, dark horizontal line in the flames in the center opening. That is the staff of Old Man Michael, a member of our theme camp who passed away in 2018. We let it go.
