drake’s deconstruction, black rock city 2009
The first time I went to Burning Man, I had the good fortune to magically and randomly camp next to some truly amazing people. Every year that I return, its always a high priority of mine to reconnect with this small group of people I first met in 2006. When I caught up with David
and Susan
they almost instantly asked if I had met their neighbor yet. Yeah, check it out, she’s taking apart her car or something. Huh?
at its core, burning man is an arts festival and from my view of things, this element is really lost on many people who have never attended. There is always something really cool to see there but I guess as with anything, there is also a lot of shit to sort through in order to find it… I approached Drake’s camp with some well earned black rock city skepticism, but as it turned out, this was definitely the coolest project I saw this year.
meet Drake Logan:
Drake had put her car on a U-haul trailer in San Francisco, pulled it over the Sierras and parked it on a tarp in Nevada for the sole purpose of disassembling the vehicle down to as many independent nuts, bolts and assorted metal and plastic pieces as possible. All for the sake of loading every single part into the U-haul, bringing it back to the bay and assembling it into some kind of sculpture. Instantly, I was captivated by such a seemingly maniacal prospect.
People talk a lot of shit about what they want to do with their art projects and if I had overheard this on a Sunday morning in early August at Ritual, I would have walked out onto Valencia laughing to myself and probably would have told jokes to my camp mates about some burner pipe dream I heard about at hipster central.
But when I first heard about this project, the car was more than half taken apart and the tables were entirely turned. I was pretty awestruck at the gravity of what was going on. Its hard enough getting yourself and what you need to burning man, this was really taking things to the next level.
When you work with, or hang around artists for any amount of time, it becomes easy enough to identify the arc of any creative process. A lot of time is spent thinking about how or why some action is going to occur. A lot of time is spent preparing for that action once it is determined what that action actually is. And then, at some user defined point, that action is executed and for me, that’s always the most exciting time to be around or in the creative process. The thinking, planning and finishing all have their own mood but the doing is where I can usually catch the crest of that wave of energy, get up on it and ride it to the heart of the matter.
And that’s exactly where Drake was when I walked into her camp: completely excited, bursting with wholly positive energy, beaming that “YES, Im DOING this” light and everyone that got near her felt it.
After shooting for a short while Drake asked me if I had an opinion on the best way to get the top of the engine block case off. It was then I realized the absolute best part of this project: Drake’s not a mechanic. Awesome. It was enough to drag a car out there to take it apart, but to go through that without expert knowledge on how to do it? Amazing.
During the time I was hanging around, lots of people passed through and most were asked if they knew about cars or had any advice on the logical order to proceed with the task at hand, whatever it was at the moment. This really blew my mind and totally transformed this project into something way way way cooler than what it had initially appeared to be.
Another thing not often understood about the festival is that it is truly a “leave no trace” event. Once youve gone out there you realize how misused that phrase is. There is no trash disposal at burning man. what you bring in, you bring out, down to every little bit of trash you generate.
Its one thing to camp under those circumstances, but to fully strip an automobile and collect every single piece of material? Ever break auto glass into a million pieces? Ever change the oil on your car in your driveway? Ever think about how many pieces of things are in a car? crazy.
You can view a trailer of the documentary video Julia Robertson has shot of Drake’s work.
Drake’s show runs today, 2 November through 26 December at the Float Center in Oakland CA. The opening party is scheduled for this coming Saturday, 7 November at 6 pm. If you are in the Bay Area, might be worth stopping in to see how this evolved.