Welcome! One way or another, you've found your way here. Have a look around to find pictures and info for the Burning Man Honorarium Project, "Another Door".

What's Burning Man? It's a gathering of about 60,000 creative and intrepid individuals who live together for a week in a constructed community called Black Rock City, Nevada.

What's that got to do with 'Another Door'? This year, the Black Rock Arts Foundation funded our proposal to create this sculpture for Burning Man 2011.

What's the sculpture? Another Door is an interactive sculpture made primarily of doors, frames and walls. This structure creates passageways for the participant to navigate and experience. Each door is connected to one another through an overhead bicycle wheel and webbing mechanism so that when one door closes, another door opens. This will leave the viewer with a revelatory experience as to the unintended effects of their actions on other people's experiences.

Want to get involved? We appreciate people's involvement in any way, whether through donations, physically helping or just interest in our project. Click the "Get Involved" tab to find out more.

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Concepts and Ideas
You wake up in the morning staring straight up at the ceiling and roll over to look at the clock. Immediately you are faced with a decision: is it time to wake up, or should you go back to sleep? You choose to get up. Now that you're standing, you have to decide whether to change out of the shirt you slept in, whether or not to shower, or whether to wear the blue one or the red one. You have only been awake a few minutes and already you're bombarded with questions, options, decisions and solutions.

It is evident that in life we are constantly assessing and deciding how to address the world around us. As cognitive beings we use our minds to shape our future; our decisions lead us forward to new paths and new options as we weave our way through reality. One of the most interesting aspects of this process is the unexpected, unforeseen consequences and effects that our decisions have on ourselves and each other. Commonly referred to as the butterfly effect, this much discussed and debated phenomenon plays a huge role in all of our lives. As a common saying has it, "When one door closes, another door opens."

"Another Door" represents the continuous process by which our everyday actions shape not only our own future but also the future of others. As we learn to understand the interconnectedness of the apparently separate parts of our world, we are able to become better members of our local and global community. This process of realization serves as a rite of passage toward the evolution of our society.

This work creates a space for both individual and group reflection. Amidst the sometimes chaotic action, people will be able to sit peacefully and ponder how they fit into this whole mess of continuous interaction. Ultimately the project will catalyze citizens' journeys towards positive social participation.

Physical Description
I can see a vague structure through the haze of dust.  It seems to be some sort of building, alive and breathing.  There is a warmly lit room with light spilling out onto the playa. I can make out the shape of an intricate framework of doors in seemingly constant motion, opening and closing, closing and opening. Figures explore the structure, weaving through its doorways, curious about what it all means.  Above the structure there is a complex tangle of belts and wheels, spinning and turning in an intricate ballet of mechanical functions. The ropes cross in all directions, looping around hoops attached to the doors and connecting each door to several others. My attention is drawn down to the wall of doors directly in front of me, and I am faced with a decision - which door will I enter?  I scan the structure and immediately I am attracted to an old weathered barn door. Its oversized hinges and worn wood look as though it contains ancient secrets and untold stories. As I reach for its handle, it springs open in front of me of its own accord and closes in the threshold adjacent to it. Flustered, I reach for it again, pull it open with a firm tug and enter. From the inside it is apparent that the whole structure is made up almost exclusively of doors. The elaborate rope system overhead acts as the physical connection between the doors. As my eyes follow the ropes from the door I entered I see that they lead across the structure and are attached to another door, where I catch the beaming smile of another participant. We laugh together as we begin to understand that we are connected.  The shared realization warms me and  I am eager to explore further. Onward I go through another door, which opens into a large central space.  In here there is a raised platform with built-in seating and two heating lamps. The platform shines bright from beneath the floor, illuminating people's faces and the rigging overhead. People naturally gravitate toward this center to discuss themselves, their experiences and their reactions. The platform has multiple levels which create a dynamic space for people to move in and interact. In this space I realize that every door I opened also opened or closed another door somewhere else in the structure, that my actions and decisions affected the whole structure, and that in one way or another I shaped other people's experiences.