Tag Archives: indiegogo

Feb 27 2014

Marco’s R-Evolution

truth-and-beauty-2013Marco Cochrane‘s amazing sculptures are built by hand, a combination of clay molding and spot welding. Bliss Dance is so strong that you could walk on her torso, and yet all the weight is concentrated on a single foot. Last year, Truth is Beauty debuted in all her glory, and was surely one of the most memorable art pieces of the year. If you went to Burning Man and took photos, but didn’t get one of this, I’d be amazed. The first time I went to check it out they gave me a bracelet to show supports for the sisters on the Playa – which was pretty special to me personally because my sister was flying in later that day for her first Burn.

Now Marco is creating the third installment in his Bliss Project series, R-Evolution. Support the project here. He has used the same model throughout the series, 6-foot tall Deja Solis. “Truth is beauty represents the moment of her accepting her truth: that she’s tall”, says Marco.

The Monterey County Weekly shares the back story to the series:

He found his model in the now-shuttered Blockbuster Video next to the Pacific Grove Trader Joe’s. And he let her, Monterey native Jamie Deja Solis, pick the poses for his pieces.

For “Truth Is Beauty,” she chose a stretching moment she remembered in front of the mirror, finally embracing the atypical height that had always made her self-conscious. “He asked me, ‘When did you truly feel beautiful?’” Solis says. “I was learning to self-love.”

At the base of the statue in Black Rock Desert, a single question written in hundreds of languages asked onlookers to consider a world where that kind of comfort, freedom and security were realized: “What would the world be like if all women were safe?” Safe to be themselves, to be open and affirming, to be beautiful.

“Women always tell me, ‘I’m safe,’” says Cochrane, now based in Mill Valley. “But can you walk down street and look a man in eye and smile?’ ‘No way,’ they say.”

They held talks and distributed 10,000 wristbands with a picture of the sculpture and the words, “We stand with you,” starting right there at Burning Man. There are no available stats on sexual assault on the playa, but anecdotes are all too easy to come by. And the reporting is complicated by the lack of rape kits to collect forensic evidence in Black Rock City.

“It was weirdly magical to meet so many folks,” Solis says. “Sometimes it was making a woman know she can be beautiful, that she didn’t need to force it. Other times it was telling her partner to stay present when she’s feeling open. Men often don’t allow the vulnerability to be open and truly share. They should be able to feel that and express it.”

Now an international tour is in the offing, with which Cochrane will continue asking people to look at body language more than body parts. “If you’re a man and you’re straight, you’ve been stunned by a woman before,” Cochrane says. “But there is a real person living in that body. Deja is a regular person. The statute is intended to be stunningly beautiful, to knock your socks off, but remind you there’s a real person there, and she’s safe.”

Maybe most stunning of all: That we need to be reminded one in three women has been sexually assaulted. But “Truth Is Beauty” also reminds us, even ugly truths can be stunningly beautiful.

There’s certainly a noble message behind Marco’s art, which is something you won’t find everywhere at the world’s biggest mutant art festival. For example, I’m thinking, the Arctic Boob Cooler I remember from 2004 was maybe towards the other end of the spectrum of nobility – yet also very popular and memorable.

For R-Evolution, Marco has created a 15-foot high clay sculpture of the piece from her lithe form.

If you like the art, support the project. Here’s some details from Marco:

How was Cargo Cult for you? 

Wow what a year we had!  With all of your help, we were able to raise enough money to complete Truth is Beauty and bring her to Burning Man in 2013.  We are so gratified by the response she received on the Playa – even we were amazed at how she looked from different angles, at different times a day, and OH! the light shows – 6 different shows thanks to Ka-Ping Yee, our uber-talented lighting engineer!!

We felt awe witnessing the impact on people as they read the inscription around her base: “What Would the World be Like if Women Were Safe?”  There was Playa magic when Truth is Beauty replaced the “I” in BELIEVE after it fell down in the pre-event windstorms and when she held a rainbow or the sun.  There were the hundreds of people who stopped us to tell us their own personal stories of how they were affected when they saw her, and thousands who wrote their feelings and opinions down in the books we provided.  We handed out nearly 10,000 “Together We Stand” wristbands, calling on those who wore them to take active responsibility for the safety of their sisters; each a unique opportunity for a personal connection and conversation.  It was such a success, we are working on how to bring this campaign to the wider world!

Thank you…Thank you…Thank You…for opening your hearts and minds to the messenger and the meaning!!

 What’s Next?

I have started work on R-Evolution, the third sculpture in the Bliss Project series.  I recently finished the 15 foot clay sculpture  – the first stage in the process – and plan to start the mold to cast the pieces from which the steel structure will be built in the next week or so.

Our plan is to debut her at Burning Man 2015.  Why not this year?  These sculptures take thousands of hours to build and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.  It simply cannot be done in one year.  So, we embark on another two-year build, but we really need your help because we not only need time, we need funds as well!  Through a combination of this campaign, grants and generous individual donors and foundations we hope to be able to raise all of the money we need this year to get R-Evolution where she needs to be so that we can complete her in time for her planned debut.

To meet our goal, we will need to have her torso and calves complete by August.  To do this, we need to be able to purchase the steel, and all of the ancillary welding materials as well as the rust-treatment on these pieces.  Of course we will also have to cover operating costs such as rent, utilities, insurance, certified welders, engineering and labor for those who will be working full-time.

What is R-Evolution?

Another collaboration with Deja Solis , R-Evolution is different than Bliss Dance and Truth is Beauty. There is no overt action in her expression; she is not dancing in the face of danger, she is not reaching to meet herself and find her own truth.  In R-Evolution, Deja explores and expresses what she feels like when she can just be…a whole person… a woman, radiating her energy into the world.  Of course, this won’t solve everything, but we think a world where women are free to just be is an essential first step.  It’s R-Evolution it’s…

                     What the world will be like when women are safe.

What was your inspiration for the Bliss Project Series?

The story of R-Evolution and The Bliss Project began when I was 7-years old and my best friend was a 9-year old little girl.  One day I was told, in way too much detail for a little boy, that she had been raped right outside of my house.  It was incomprehensible, horrible, I never forgot, I never understood…it still haunts me.  I thought…that man couldn’t have realized my friend was a person…if he really could see her, this wouldn’t have happened.

I grew up in the Bay Area in the 60’s and 70’s, in the philosophical revolution and turbulence of those times.  I learned to deeply appreciate feminine energy, influence and strength…and realized that the objectification of women imprisoned women and also men.  I also saw first-hand that one person, or a small group of people, can start a movement that can make a difference and change the course of history.

In my 20s I discovered sculpting, and in particular, the joy of seeing and then sculpting women; of the healing energy and power that I saw when women were not afraid…when they could be present, when they could be themselves, speak their minds…and the heroism it takes to do this in the face of real danger in their daily lives.  For more than 25 years I have been sculpting women.  At first glance, they appear to be classical figurative nudes, but they are not.  They are radically modern…revolutionary.  These women are safe, present. Look at them. They have chosen their own expression, so you will see the actual woman, the person, her energy and spirit.  It is my intent that these sculptures exude this healing energy and inspire us to take action; to finally say enough is enough.

What can Burners do to help?

Art can illuminate the human condition and be a catalyst to social change …My hope is to expand human consciousness and inspire men and women to take action to end violence against women, beginning a healing process that will make room for women’s voices, thus allowing all of us to live fully and thrive! I am asking you to stand with us!

Thank you to everyone for the incredible support you have provided in the past, and to everyone who is considering supporting R-Evolution. There is just no way projects like this could happen without you!

Donate now and spread the word. We have some great perks, including pendants, mini-sculptures  – 6 inch versions – experiences., etc.  Plus, everyone get’s a Together We Stand Wristband.  Check it out!

Visit Bliss Dance now on Treasure Island, San Francisco – even little babies who can’t speak yet love it.

Nov 27 2013

Miss Molly Goes to War

by Whatsblem the Pro

CJ Hardin has gone from PTSD to MDMA to A-OK

CJ Hardin has gone from PTSD to MDMA to A-OK

CJ Hardin first went to Burning Man in 2006; when he can make it to Black Rock City he volunteers as a medic. He spins fire staff, and is learning ball poi.

Outside Black Rock City, CJ Hardin is a soldier whose three tours in Iraq and Afghanistan left him an alcohol-soaked, suicidal wreck peppered with physical, emotional, and psychological trauma. The physical damage wasn’t much – some minor injuries, a touch of tinnitus – but the PTSD he suffered picked him up by the scruff of the neck and took him right out of his life.

Michael and Annie Mithoefer are burners, too, and more formally known as Dr. Michael Mithoefer, MD, and his co-therapist, Annie Mithoefer, BSN. The couple run a well-regarded internal medicine practice in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.

The Mithoefers are currently conducting clinical trials as part of a ten-year, $15,000,000 project that intends to transform MDMA — sometimes sold under the street names Molly, Ecstasy, or X, among others — from an illegal street drug into an FDA-approved prescription medicine. CJ Hardin is a patient in one of those trials.

The project is being administered by a non-profit organization called MAPS, or the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies. MAPS, currently the only organization in the world funding clinical trials of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy, has earned a solid reputation in the scientific community by doing peer-reviewed work on the legitimate medical uses of psychedelics and marijuana since 1986.

To a non-profit organization like MAPS, exploring the medical uses of MDMA makes good sense, because the patent on the drug has expired. This being the case, the for-profit pharmaceutical industry has little or no interest in testing and developing the drug into a product. Once someone like MAPS does it, the for-profit big boys in the big league may manufacture their own version and sell it alongside the patented products they own, but since they can’t hold a monopoly on the drug, there’s no money to be made in doing the groundwork that must come first. This is part of the reason why MDMA has remained on the government’s Schedule 1 list of substances that supposedly have no medicinal value.

All the drugs that MAPS works with either have expired patents, like MDMA, or are unpatentable, like marijuana; once the research allows products to be manufactured from them, nobody – not even MAPS – will have a monopoly on making and selling them, and thus they will likely remain cheap or even free to the people who need them most.

I interviewed CJ Hardin about his progress with the Mithoefers’ MDMA-assisted psychotherapy on Tuesday, November 26th, 2013.

Whatsblem the Pro:
CJ, you’re a burner, right? How did you find your way to Black Rock City the first time?

CJ Hardin:
I went with friends in 2006, after my second Iraq deployment. I really didn’t know much, other than that it was a huge party with cool music and art in the desert. We rented a bus and really kinda glamped it. I didn’t know that it was such a participatory event, but I really started to enjoy it once I began talking to fire spinners, since I had done fancy drill teams with rifles in the JROTC. I had a great time, but also gained a deeper appreciation for the burner community. I really appreciated how Burning Man set itself apart from music festivals I had been to, like the Family Values Tour, and Bonaroo.

Whatsblem the Pro:
How long have you had PTSD, and how long have you been doing the MDMA therapy?

CJ Hardin:
I got deployed in 2003 during the initial push to Baghdad, and served three tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. I started to really feel it after the second deployment.

I’ve been in the MDMA study since midsummer of 2013, and I’m about to do my third MDMA session, on December 3rd. If I haven’t been getting the higher of the two doses they’re testing, I’ll get another five sessions with the high dose after this.

Whatsblem the Pro:
This is a horribly rude question that I wouldn’t ask under other circumstances, but would you mind telling me something about the experiences you had that left you with PTSD?

CJ Hardin:
Well, I’ve been hit by two IEDs while in armored vehicles, but I wasn’t seriously injured, just some hearing loss. I was hit by a bullet fragment from friendly fire that made me think I was shot. . . and pretty much every day we were being targeted with mortar and rocket fire, so we could never really feel safe. On top of that, I was a member of a command team, so I got to see all the operational stuff and the casualties. There was a lot of gory stuff, and friends getting injured and killed. . . and of course never knowing whether a mortar was going to drop on you in your sleep or on the shitter was a really bad feeling that dissociates you from the real world. All of it combined was the problem.

Whatsblem the Pro:
What sort of symptoms did you develop?

CJ Hardin:
Any sudden noise, change of air pressure in the room, motion. . . I’d get hyper-vigilant. Rapid pulse, crippling anxiety. Depression. A need to avoid crowds. Driving became impossible; I’d swerve to avoid anything near the road because it would remind me of IEDs. I got into some major alcohol abuse to keep my mind off stuff. Insomnia. Lack of a sex drive. Thanks to the IEDs, I’ve also got permanent tinnitus, which is a ringing in the ears.

I got to the point where I stayed home and never went out. I didn’t even try to work really, just did odd jobs. I had a lot of suicidal thoughts.

Whatsblem the Pro:
How has the therapy you’ve been doing with the Mithoefers affected all this?

CJ Hardin:
Working with them and with the MDMA has vastly reduced all the symptoms. Some are gone totally. I go out and hike and drive now; I don’t jump as much at all at sudden things; I’m much better with crowds now. Essentially, I realize on a gut level that I’m not at war any more, and I’m safe.

Whatsblem the Pro:
All that, with just two sessions?

CJ Hardin:
Two sessions with the MDMA, and some therapy sessions in between, yes. I’m about to do the third MDMA session.

Whatsblem the Pro:
It sounds like you got your life back.

CJ Hardin:
I did get my life back! There was a profound difference after the first session. . . and my girlfriend benefits by having a sane boyfriend. Did I mention that I lost my marriage due to the PTSD?

Whatsblem the Pro:
I’ve read that a single dose of MDMA might be worth years of psychotherapy.

CJ Hardin:
Oh, yeah. . . eight hours of therapy with MDMA feels like three years of therapy without it.

Whatsblem the Pro:
What went with the MDMA? Were you guided through any particular experience with it, or did they just give it to you and babysit passively?

CJ Hardin:
Oh no, I was totally guided. The doctor and his wife, who is a nurse, were with me the whole time. There was soft music playing, and they gave me a sleeping blindfold in case I wanted to “go inside.” My girlfriend was there for most of the time, too. They let me talk about whatever. Sometimes they would remind me of what I was saying or get me back on a train of thought.

Whatsblem the Pro:
They told you to go inside yourself?

CJ Hardin:
Yep. After I’d talk about something a little more intense, they’d suggest that I go inside and try to feel where I felt the feelings. . . then breathe through it. To dwell on it, kind of.

Whatsblem the Pro:
I can see that happening at a theme camp at Burning Man, too.

Thank you, CJ. This is fascinating research, and from what you’re telling me it seems very promising. Is there anything the community can do to get involved and help?

CJ Hardin:
Actually, yes. . . the study I’m taking part in right now needs funding to continue. It’s all non-profit, and runs on donations, so there’s an Indiegogo campaign that you can give money to. You can read all about the clinical trials and the science and everything there, too.

I really believe that the work the Mithoefers are doing is going to end up helping a lot of people who need help badly and can’t get it because MDMA is illegal. It’s helping me, and I’m very grateful. Please give generously!

Whatsblem the Pro:
Good luck, CJ! We’re rooting for you.

May 28 2013

THE POOR MAN’S BURNING MAN 2: The Glamorous Life of a Model

by Whatsblem the Pro

Houston, we have a Whatsblem.

Houston, we have a Whatsblem.

[Whatsblem the Pro is embedded in the International Arts Megacrew for the building of THE CONTROL TOWER, a sixty-foot “cargo cult” version of an FAA control tower, equipped with lasers and flame effects and other interactive features. This series of articles begins with The Poor Man’s Burning Man: Part One, and shows you how you can attend Burning Man even if you don’t sleep on a giant pile of money at night.]

The Control Tower project is still in fundraising/proof-of-concept mode at this relatively early date, which is possible because the actual build will be so much easier than a frame structure like the IAM’s Temple of Transition in 2011. The Tower’s main structural members are all bamboo, so there won’t be much to do for the hammer-swingers that made up the bulk of the crew for the Temple build. The Tower would represent a daunting challenge to an untested group, but it’s going to be a cakewalk of a build when compared with projects the IAM already has under its belt.

We proved that in the last week by assembling a twelve-foot 1:5 scale model of the Tower, to test the ease of construction and structural integrity of the thing. Ken Rose opted to go with lengths of bamboo that are actually only two-thirds actual scale in diameter; if these are sufficient to build a solid model, then we can be supremely confident that the real thing at sixty feet tall will be generously overbuilt in terms of structural strength.

The Tower uncrowned, at 1:5 scale

The Tower uncrowned, at 1:5 scale

The model went up like a dream. A little light tugging and measuring was necessary to pull it into true, and then lashings of hemp rope were applied at the intersections of the bamboo poles. Even with only the lower lashings in place, you can reach out and give the thing a good shaking, without it needing to flex more than about a centimeter to absorb the shocks. The Tower will be light, but incredibly strong and flexible, and should be able to easily withstand even the strongest gusts of wind we might encounter.

The crew is still a small core group, with casual labor on hand when needed, mostly thanks to locals from the 2011 Temple crew. Right now it’s a matter of pulling together the top technical people – our laser expert, our flame effects specialist, our Arduino guy, etc. – with IAM’s architect, Ken Rose, and letting them hash out the best ways to accommodate each others’ work.

It’s also fundraising time. This project won’t happen without funding, and the Org has chosen not to give the IAM a grant this year. All the money has to come from the generous contributions of burners who have enjoyed the crew’s past work, and want to see more. As I write this, we’ve got just half of the $25,000 we’ll need, with only eleven days left on our Indiegogo campaign.

At this stage, my role has mostly been related to that need for funding. The IAM is a non-profit organization with a 501(3)(c) conduit that allows us to give a tax deduction on most donations of money, goods, or services; I spend my mornings and the early afternoons on the phone and the computer, calling business owners and managers and asking them to kick something, anything, into the pot that we can use to defray our costs. Computer parts. Welding rod. Bottled water for on-playa. Stuff we can raffle off at fundraisers, like dinner for two at a nice restaurant. Food for our crew.

A lot of people say no, but a good many say yes. The local mom-and-pops are as good to us as they can afford to be. Some big corporations say yes right away, but they have protocols in place that prevent them from helping out too much. Every little bit counts, so we take what we can get gratefully; still, it seems a shame that a giant “big box” store chain with literally billions in their coffers can only give us a maximum of $25 worth of goods, while a struggling local business can find a way to make underwriting hundreds or thousands of dollars of our expenses a net positive for them too.

Sometimes it’s a total win-win when you call someone on the phone and ask what they can do to help out with your project, even if they don’t have a lot of ready cash. I chanced on a company that makes solar water heating systems using a patented heating element they invented themselves; they’re still a start-up, and poised to expand, so they don’t have the liquid assets to just dump cash on us. . . but when I mention Burning Man, they tell me they have been wanting to build a self-contained water-recycling shower trailer using their solar heaters, so they’ll have something to take to festivals and show off. After a meeting with the company’s partners, the CEO, a gentleman in his sixties and a deacon at a local church, comes to visit us at our build site. He likes what he sees so much that he actually ends up signing a site waiver and climbing up a twelve-foot ladder to help assemble our scale model of the Control Tower. As we break for dinner and part ways, he shakes my hand and tells me they’ll build their shower trailer project for our crew to use on the playa. I let him know that he won’t be able to do any kind of advertising out there, but he’s fine with that; he wants to see Burning Man for himself and will put off using the shower trailer as a rolling billboard until he can haul it out to some other festival.

Architect Ken Rose -- Photo: Mark Hebert

Architect Ken Rose — Photo: Mark Hebert

There are just two snags: one is that they’ll need a little help with the labor; that’s no problem at all. The other is that they don’t have any cash to put into the shower trailer project, and they are lacking the filtration system they’ll need to turn greywater from the shower’s drains back into potable water ready to be used again. They’ve got everything else necessary to build the high-tech closed system they envision, but we’re going to have to come up with two different types of filter on our own. One type we can make ourselves cheaply and easily; the other type that we’ll need will be expensive.

On my way home, I stop at a large pool and spa store, and the owner happens to be there and not at all busy. We have a friendly talk and I tell her about the Control Tower; she’s been to Burning Man and promises me that once I figure out exactly what size and type of filter we need, she’ll donate it.

People are pretty generous, and just plain great in general, when you give them a good opportunity to be that way for a cause that excites their imaginations.

Aside from fundraising, I’ve been pitching in on things like painting the wooden parts for the scale model, or doing whatever else needs extra hands, but that’s been pretty light work.

I’ve also been gearing up to do some indirect fundraising, by making swag to give to people who donate to our Indiegogo. I hand-carve and tool leather, so I thought I’d decorate some leather panels and stitch them around metal liquor flasks. I finished my prototype yesterday; you can’t buy one at any price, but if you donate $250 to the Control Tower I’ll make one for you for free. . . and if you come to the Control Tower to collect it on-playa, I’ll even fill it with Scotch for you.

DOOK DOOK DOOK

DOOK DOOK DOOK

Cheers!