Manish Arora appropriating art for his fashion show.

[carefactornil]

Lots of press about how "burner" Manish Arora has wowed Paris Fashion week with his new collection, "inspired" by BM. Except some pieces appear to have messages from the Temple on. And many have direct copies of art pieces which is just theft of IP if the owners didn't give permission. And there is a LOT of stuff that has been used in terms of art pieces.

https://www.sleek-mag.com/article/manis ... rning-man/

See Halycon's rant about this:


I hope the Org send a loud clear message to him that this is NOT OK. This feels like another Krug PR disaster in the waiting...

[Ano]

I think it's worth noting that:

1. This is a disgusting example of where we've been going for a while by tolerating camps that directly enable these kinds of people to attend the event. "Spreading the BM Ethos" be damned, the people responsible for this probably attended and clearly missed the entire "BM Ethos" part of the event.

2. The Burning Man Cultural Direction Setting Facebook deleted a well-traveled discussion post about this very thing - as far as I can tell, this would definitely fall under an appropriate thing to discuss regarding the direction of the culture

EDIT: The post is now back, either Facebook was freaking out, or it was temporarily removed and reinstated, I don't know. Foot, meet mouth.

[dpsrch]

Can you link to the burning man cultural direction setting discussion on facebook? Thanks.

[AntiM]

Report to doingitwrong@burningman.org

[carefactornil]

Thanks AntiM

Done

[some seeing eye]

If you look at low income tickets, art grants, transportation, and regional activities, it is clear that the organizers are interested in promoting international expansion.

They have also been interested in expansion of nonprofit donations from luxury burners promoted by placement and OSS policies.

They promised they would acculturate the latter, but that effort is not working out so well yet.

Now they need to acculturate the former international guests with different IP expectations about appropriation of artistic work, hard work, from the event itself.

The sticky wicket is litigation which can generate more publicity for the appropriator vs effective shaming.

Placement has to not only have a MOOP plan, but a prevention of IP artist & event appropriation plan, an immediacy plan, and many other plans. The moop plan in the application is usually formulaic. But the moop plan results are 100% measured. So how do you create measurable camp-level plans for culture?

[A-RockLeFrench]

This is exactly what we need in that Trump may well be exactly what America needed.

[Token]

This is exactly what we need in that Trump may well be exactly what America needed deserves .

FTFY

[Ano]

This is exactly what we need in that Trump may well be exactly what America needed.

In a somewhat roundabout way, I kind of agree here. I think this was a big slap in the face, especially considering that the BORG just came out and said "hey, lets talk about this," started the dialogue up again...

And then, I loop back to discussions Headmaster of Playaskool had in 2012 with the borg, and how they justified their actions by saying they bring influential individuals to spread the ideas...

... and then this is how one "influential individual" chooses to spread his concept of Burning Man, by egregiously missing the point, not asking permission, and appropriating the fuck outta the whole thing. For a person who has apparently attended the event for a few years, to come away thinking "im gonna rip off art and put it into high fashion," yeah. No. fuck that.

I would argue that there would be a way to tastefully combine "Burning Man" and "high fashion," in the same way I combine my profession with Burning Man - under the radar, with mild suggestion, and observable to those in-the-know but curious to those who are not. But Mr. Arora did not do this. He didn't even ask permission from some of the artists featured here. He just... okay, I think the temple is goofy and it isn't for me, but holy shit, he really made yoga pants of temple-like writing.

[Ano]

Huh. Looks like the Treasurer for the borg attended, and was in support of it.

Plot thickens?

[burner von braun]

Here is a response from the BMorg

https://journal.burningman.org/2019/03/ ... ification/

[A-RockLeFrench]

^^ those comments on the 'official' response are as usual right on




Plot thickens? Yeah like those microwavable oatmeal packets, but not the ones with the delicious little fake strawberries in it, more like the 'cinnamon and spice' ones that taste like the dust bunnies from underneath grandmas couch.


But seriously, what the fuck did anyone expect to have happen? The culture was sliding towards the edge since long before my freshman ass ever graced the playa (2010) and now its at the obvious point. Rich people commodify everything and sell it to other rich people while us plebes get left with the mess. They'll spin it and polish the image (turd) and claim to be shocked and outraged but when the dust settles we'll still have the photos and stories of the same idiots in charge rubbing elbows with the same bourgeois assholes who drove it into the fucking dust. And I'm not talking about the good kind of dust here either.


Time for a new party.

[Papa Bear]

Huh. Looks like the Treasurer for the borg attended, and was in support of it.

Said treasurer (Jennifer Raiser) has also posted a public response and apology (linked in several places in the comments in that article), in which she acknowledges that she was there at the invitation of the designer (who is a personal friend), not in any org capacity, and gives more details of exactly what she knew when and how she reacted.

Personally, I take her at her word, and I think those jumping to the conclusion that the org in any way supported or condoned this are misguided.

[Lonesomebri]

Faith that those destroying the culture are actually not, is comical at some point. Should I have laminated apology cards printed up to hand out after I go around shitting in each plug n play and fashion camp?

[A-RockLeFrench]

But.. But.. But..


I hear he's a really cool guy.

[Papa Bear]

I don't particularly care whether or not he's a cool guy. He blew it, big time.

As for Ms. Raiser, I can absolutely see being thrilled to be invited by a friend to his runway show, and excited to hear that his experiences at Burning Man helped inspire his line. There are lots of subtle ways a designer could draw inspiration from the burn in ways that would be perfectly acceptable to put on a runway, though this obviously didn't turn out to be one of them.

I can also see that initial excitement turning to concern once you actually see those outfits for the first time. I can also see where you might assume that someone you consider a friend wouldn't mislead you about having gotten permission from the artists.

She's apologized, and indicated that she's going to be more skeptical and aggressive about challenging this kind of thing in the future. That's what I would want someone in her position to do in this particular situation. If other evidence turned up that she did have prior knowledge, then my opinion would change pretty dramatically, but for now I'm comfortable applying Hanlon's razor.

If someone else wants to assume she's lying and that this is all part of some big conspiracy where the org approved it all and is now backtracking to cover their asses, I guess that's their prerogative. I just think that's based on paranoia rather than evidence.

[Lonesomebri]

The proof is in the pudding, cut from whole clothe.

[A-RockLeFrench]

Ok maybe the sarcasm wasn't that obvious. The whole "he/they/she is a cool person" rhetoric has been used as a defense for all kinds of shitty and un-burnery behavior for years and years.

No one said big conspiracy. But whether or not the lady has a good excuse the whole thing is yet another glaring example of how out of fucking touch the leadership is. At a time when the culture of and surrounding the event is under attack from bougie douche-nozzles.

[Papa Bear]

Oh, I recognized the sarcasm, and I absolutely agree with you that being a cool guy doesn't excuse that kind of behavior. It's appalling just how many responses to that journal article seem to think it should, though.

I'm just trying to draw the distinction I see between one person who did something egregious, and another person who seems to have been blindsided by what the first one did.

As for the conspiracy thing, I'm sorry if I seemed to imply that's what you were suggesting. But there are others here who do appear to believe that Raiser's explanation is false and that she was an "accomplice", potentially along with other members of the org. That's what I find over the top.

Edit: And yes, I agree the leadership seems very much out of touch. I think the "cultural direction" discussions are a belated attempt to remedy that, but I am surprised it had to get this far for that to happen.

[Lonesomebri]

Surprised it got this far yet some are still making excuses.

[FIGJAM]

The apology was ok, but she didn't say she was going to track him down and beat him with a big stick until he understood what decommodification really means!!!

[Lonesomebri]

It's sadly amusing that in other forums and threads and ideals, the problem with the cultural drift is attributed to new people not being acclimated enough to the principles by old time experienced Burners. If only this guy would have been mentored by someone more involved with the Burn, right?