My Camp and Art

This section is devoted to photos around my camp, and of my art installations and my art car. However, it's not simply photos of my campmates, it is for everybody.

This year I had 3 installations, an art car and the protest march, as well as the usual photography.

As always, the centerpiece of camp was the photo wall, which was denser than ever and always had a good crowd. The phone booth stayed next to it all week. This year I thank Brent for taking over most of the work on the project.

My ATM machine, which dispenses special playa money, including gifting money, was intended to be retired and had been destroyed, but because this year's American Dream theme shouted money, it returned as theme art. This year I mounted it on a fake brick wall, like a bank wall, and added a blinking red LED "ATM" sign. As a result lots of folks used it, and we gave away almost all the money. The wall was tagged (vandalized) on the final day.

The big new project was the art car. I did not build this beautiful art car. It was painstaking constructed by two friends and campmates, Bill Bonner and Nancy Panitch. Due to illness they could not return to the Playa, and I inherited the car, and did the work to get it back to the playa as promised. The car looks amazing by day and night, having 800 watts of lights on it which require a generator. Inside it's an old 2-stroke golf cart, so it's not able to give rides to many people, but it gets admired everywhere it goes. Indeed, we got somewhat embarassed by all the constant compliments on its appearance, because you can't tell everybody you see that the compliments are really owed to somebody else.

(1267 x 950 - 177K) Camp, with two segway visitors to the phone booth.
(1267 x 950 - 213K) I'm on a Segway in front of my Art Car. Decadent. Note my theme shirt, $8 at Marshalls.		(713 x 950 - 140K) The ATM's brick wall after it was tagged by vandals.
(713 x 950 - 107K) The phone was also tagged by vandals, 3 times.		(1267 x 950 - 120K) I burn the ATM's wooden parts
(1300 x 867 - 212K) My art car, viewed from the top of the tower of Babel		(1300 x 867 - 203K) People examine the photo wall and wait for the phone.
(633 x 950 - 119K) ATM customer examines his playa money.		(1300 x 867 - 201K) A line forms for the shaved ice pushcart in our camp. Unlike sno-kones, we had a fancy Japanese shaved ice machine
(1300 x 867 - 237K) A phone line in front of the Groove Bomb, our neighbour's mobile stage.		(1300 x 867 - 208K) Photo wall, phone, ATM and Groove Bomb.
(1300 x 867 - 157K) Crowd, including one of the many recent visitors to glitter camp, checks out a smoke vortex.		(1300 x 867 - 125K) My art car, formerly named the Illuminated Mystic Transport. New name pending
(1300 x 867 - 148K) Art Car, back side of photo wall and phone.		(1300 x 867 - 187K) Critical Tits ride goes by my camp
(1300 x 867 - 197K) The line of men (not from our camp) watches the Critical Tits ride go by. Tastefully shot from the back.		(1300 x 867 - 192K) We put up some "Save the Man" signs in advance on the Esplanade
(1300 x 867 - 146K) As it got darker, the phone line would get longer.		(1300 x 867 - 99K) Or other neighbours, DOTA, were out every sunset with a great array of kites
(1300 x 867 - 123K) K. rides in the art car

An art car is of course wonderful, both as a piece of art to show off, and for me, a way to get around with lots of photo gear to do photography. However, it can also be a lot of work. The air filter clogged, and cleaning was not enough, but I did have a spare -- but that made me miss a good panorama opportunity. Drained the battery too. Will know to bring spare air filters next time.

If you are thinking of building an art car, unless you are very poor, don't stint on the base vehicle. Buy a cosmetic junker but get one with a good engine. My car's engine was in reasonably good shape, needing only a new clutch, but it's still a 2-stroke (the oldest Yamaha) and a 4-stroke would have been quieter and less smoky.

Bill built the car remarkably well, however. Driving back from Babel one day, a person going by on a community bike asked for a ride. Sorry, we said, only 2 seats; furthermore the engine had died (turned out to be the air filter) when I took 3 on it, and a 4th cyclist grabbed on for a tow, so I was skeptical. Suddenly we heard a thump -- the asshole had ditched his bike and jumped onto the tail end of the wooden frame. It looks delicate but it turned out to be strong enough to not break, and we were able to stop and get him off. He was of course ticked off that we were upset. If you build a vehicle, expect people to jump on just about any part of it, even when you tell them not to, and make it strong.