Art is everywhere, even on the participants at Burning Man
Art is everywhere, even on the participants at Burning Man
Trevor Hughes, Reno Gazette JournalSun, August 30, 2026 at 8:58 PM UTC
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BLACK ROCK CITY, Nevada — Burning Man attendees are setting aside the “default world” and entering a weeklong celebration of art, experimentation and exploration.
The sprawling weeklong event in the Northern Nevada desert effectively becomes the world’s largest art exhibit: participants will see more than 350 official pieces of art, along with more than 700 mobile “mutant vehicles.” Burning Man officially opened at midnight Sunday, Aug. 30.
Participants themselves also become artwork, with many of the approximately 70,000 attendees donning elaborate outfits during their time in Black Rock City.
Riding her e-bike along the playa Sunday morning, longtime attendee Lisa Wood, 66, paused to pose for her partner’s camera in her vintage metal bikini.
“We’re here for the art, we love the art,” Wood, a 20-year Burner from northern Utah, said. “There’s more art and it’s bigger.”
Campmate Claire Manning, 32, said she welcomed people stopping to talk about her own metal bikini.
“We’re all just so busy in our (normal) lives that we don’t even look at each other,” said Manning. “I love it here. It makes you reconnect with humanity.”
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For Ingull Jullien Jung, 55, this year’s Burn is a sad one: Her partner of 25 years died earlier this year, and she’s hosting a memorial ceremony for him later in the week. This is the first time she’s attended Burning Man without him.
She said she’s camping with his longtime Burning Man friends, sharing stories of his life both on and off the playa.
“It’s so sad but I’m so happy also,” said Jung, an art expert from Los Angeles.
The art has been such a draw that Young Smith, of San Antonio, 43, was moved to help give tours of the installations this year. He said the artwork helps foster an environment in which people feel comfortable exploring new ideas and new ways of expressing themselves.
“It’s radical expressionism, just being your true self, being able to bring out a piece of yourself that just doesn’t exist in the default world,” Smith said. “Here we accept everybody. This is the beauty: We come home for a week every year.”
As she adjusted the platform boots that made it hard to ride her e-bike, Wood said she hopes Burners remember to demonstrate the event’s governing 10 principles — which include radical self-expression, participation, communal effort and civic responsibility — when they leave Black Rock City.
“I just wish that all of us could take a little bit of Burning Man home with us, other than the dust,” she laughed.
This article originally appeared on Reno Gazette Journal: Art is everywhere, even on the participants at Burning Man
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