BUILT AROUND A SET OF GUIDING PRINCIPLES, MODIFYRE REFLECTS THESE IDEAS IN OUR EVENT AND YEAR-ROUND COMMUNITY.
WE AIM TO CREATE A TEMPORARY VILLAGE BUILT ON A GIFT ECONOMY, FUELLED BY COMMUNAL EFFORT, LIT WITH RADICAL THINKING, AND FILLED WITH PARTICIPATORY ART, THEME CAMPS, PERFORMANCE, WORKSHOPS, MUSIC AND, OF COURSE, FIRE.
AT THE HEART OF THIS VILLAGE IS THE BUG, POLLINATING
THE SEEDS OF OUR IMAGINATION. WHEN THE BUG BURNS
THESE SEEDS ARE SPREAD FAR AND WIDE, HELPING CREATIVITY BLOSSOM WHEREVER THEY LAND. WHEN WE LEAVE, WE DISMANTLE AND TAKE THE VILLAGE WITH US BACK TO OUR EVERYDAY LIVES.
UNLIKE MANY EVENTS, MODIFYRE IS NOT CREATED BY A PRODUCTION COMPANY. AT OUR EVENT, THERE ARE NO CORPORATE SPONSORS, STALLS, EXCHANGES OF MONEY,
OR SPECTATORS.
THERE’S JUST YOU, ME, AND OUR IMAGINATIONS…
Image: Megan Keene
WE BELIEVE IN THE POWER OF PARTICIPATION, THE OUTCOMES OF COMMUNAL EFFORT AND THE VALUE OF CIVIC ENGAGEMENT.
Our participants are a year-round community of radical thinkers, dreamers and doers. We come from all walks of life and all corners of the globe.
By pooling the collective resources and skills of this diverse group, we hope to grow and support a flourishing community dedicated to the propagation of participatory arts and culture in Brisbane, Regional Queensland and northern New South Wales.
THERE ARE NO PREREQUISITES FOR INVOLVEMENT IN THIS COMMUNITY – WE STRIVE TO BE RADICALLY INCLUSIVE, IRRESPECTIVE OF ONE'S BACKGROUND AND SITUATION.
Modifyre means something different to everyone that attends.
Nevertheless, our participants show up year after year, volunteering their time, skills and energy to create this five-day event in a paddock in regional Queensland, in which anything can happen.
Image: Spygel
MODIFYRE'S ETHOS IS BUILT ON
A SERIES OF GUIDING PRINCIPLES
which act as guidelines for the worldwide Burning Man Regional Network. As such, the event may be understood as a celebration of a way of life lived consistently with these principles.
The guiding principles are not intended to dictate how people should be and act, but to reflect the community’s ethos and culture as it has organically developed since Burning Man's inception.
Radical inclusion
Anyone may be a part of Modifyre. We welcome and respect the stranger.
No prerequisites exist for participation in our community.
Gifting
Modifyre is devoted to acts of gift giving. The value of a gift is unconditional.
Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.
Radical self-reliance
Burning Man encourages the individual to discover, exercise and rely on their inner resources.
Decommodification
In order to preserve the spirit of gifting, our community seeks to create social environments that are unmediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising.
We resist the substitution of consumption for participatory experience.
Radical self-expression
Radical self-expression arises from the unique gifts of the individual.
No one other than the individual or a collaborating group can determine its content.It is offered as a gift to others.
In this spirit, the giver should respect the rights and liberties of the recipient.
Communal effort
Our community values creative cooperation and collaboration.
We strive to produce, promote and protect social networks, public spaces, works of art, and methods of communication that support such interaction.
Civic responsibility
We value civil society. Community members who organise events should assume responsibility for public welfare and endeavour to communicate civic responsibilities to participants.
They must also assume responsibility for conducting events in accordance with local, state and federal laws.
Leaving no trace
Our community respects the environment. We are committed to leaving no physical trace of our activities wherever we gather.
We clean up after ourselves and endeavor, whenever possible, to leave such places in a better state than when we found them.
Participation
Our community is committed to a radically participatory ethic.
We believe that transformative change, whether in the individual or in society, can occur only through the medium of deeply personal participation. We achieve being through doing.
Everyone is invited to work. Everyone is invited to play.
We make the world real through actions that open the heart.
Immediacy
Immediate experience is, in many ways, the most important touchstone of value in our culture.
We seek to overcome barriers that stand between us and a recognition of our inner selves, the reality of those around us, participation in society, and contact with a natural world exceeding human powers.
No idea can substitute for this experience.
Consent
Considered as the "11th Principle" by some, consent respects the autonomy of the individual, who has the right to make their own choice about their own body, property, personal space and privacy.
Each one, teach one
As a self-reliant community, we believe the responsibility of spreading our culture lies with each and every one of us.
All of us are custodians of our culture – when the opportunity presents itself, we pass knowledge on.
Image Credit (symbols): James Wickham
"The Ten Principles of Burning Man" created by Larry Harvey,
is a registered copyright of the Burning Man Project.
http://burningman.org/culture/philosophical-center/10-principles/
The '10 Symbols of Burning Man' were created by Wick and shared under a
Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license. We love them!