On the Edge of Utopia: Performance and Ritual at Burning Man

During the week before Labor Day every year, 35,000 people gather in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert and build Black Rock City. At the center of Black Rock City is a 40-foot wooden effigy of a man, an icon around which art, performance, and community revolve. Since 1986, the Burning Man Festival named for this effigy has evolved from founder Larry Harvey’s personal healing ritual into a cultural movement where ceremony, religion, visual art, and performance converge on an epic scale.

In On the E...