ArtVsCommunityAtBurningMan

ThoughtStorms Wiki

A discussion that illustrated the conflict in the BurningMan community between those who think it's a commmunity festival and those who think it's an art festival.

The discussion is gone from online.

Here's the outline :

Community : community is more important. Art is nice but secondary.

Artists : Art is more important. Art exhibits are the reason people come

Community : Artists must abide by the rules.

Artists : The rules are too restrictive, we need more freedom

Community : There is sponsorship for art-works.

Artists : It's not enough (only 4% of ticket income) Plus sponsorship is decided by a historical elite, who impose lame conditions and themes. We want to open that up to a democratic process whereby everyone gets to vote for which art happens or for guest curators who'll vote for it.

Community : If you don't like it, go somewhere else

Artists : We don't want to go elsewhere. We made this as much as anyone else and have a right to it.

You can't read the petition and response, but I pointed out that ClayShirky would be all over this if it was about an online community.

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