Burning Man is an event held annually in the western United
States at Black Rock City, a temporary city erected in the Black Rock Desert of
northwest Nevada, approximately 100 miles (160 km) north-northeast of Reno,
and a thriving year-round culture generated by a global community of participants.
The late summer event in Black Rock City is an experiment in community and art,
influenced by ten main principles: radical inclusion, radical self-reliance, radical
self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, gifting, decommodification,
participation, immediacy, and leave no trace. The event takes its name from its
culmination, the symbolic ritual burning of a large wooden effigy ("The Man") that
traditionally occurs on the Saturday evening of the event.