Looks like Will Smith’s alleged appearance at last year’s Burning Man is about to be trumped by a much bigger Willie. At least, that’s what I’m calling the Boeing 747 a bunch of artists, engineers, and financiers associated with the Big Imagination Foundation want to bring to this year’s festival on the playa.
They are not planning on actually flying the aircraft at Burning Man. “While it might be theoretically possible to land a 747 on the playa, it is prohibited by the FAA for a variety of obvious reasons,” [Ken] Feldman told us. Instead, the aircraft will essentially be carted around. “We’re not just dropping a 747 on the playa. There’s going to be some heavy modifications to it. This will be heavily mutated. It’s going to have some really unique interesting creative features. We’re getting a lot of help from some really interesting people who are really putting their creative stamp on this.”
And it won’t be some billionaire Burner playhouse, either. The Big Imagination folks see it as a 300-seat egalitarian “venue on wheels” where everyone is welcome. “It started out with, ‘Wow. Can this be done? This is a formidable challenge’,” said Rob Volkel. “From there, it went a little beyond into, ‘What can we do with it once it’s on the playa? Is it just going to move around and entertain people, or can we do something really special with it? What can we do with it that has it act as a venue rather than just an art car, because this thing carries 300 people?'” (Via SFist)
A “300-seat egalitarian ‘venue on wheels'” seems fairly gaudy — no matter what anyone says. Then again, the 747 won’t be able to touch down in or take off from the area, so maybe it will help Burning Man shed the rich, Silicone Valley-esque image it recently acquired. Hell, maybe Elon Musk will throw some SpaceX money at it.
(Via SFist)