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If you want to help Timeless recover his resources and help prepare for next year's installation, you may wish to PayPal; support to timeless.sculptures@gmail.com. Thank you so much... see you on the playa!!)

Timeless is a a passionate wood sculptor (www.TimelessSculptures.com) with a story to tell and he's on a timeless, self-guided mission:


The Choice

(Concept for an installation by Matthew (Timeless) Welter)

I am proposing an installation intended as a reminder that each of us is manifesting the American Dream. Will the future allow a discussion on which type of freedom we wish to achieve? Will we achieve true freedom by destroying its established form and starting fresh or by creating a higher form of freedom from what we have?

The installation would be erected in a prominent place, as near the entrance to Center Camp as possible. It will include two separate renditions of the Statue of Liberty, each carved from a single, massive tree trunk:

1. “Anarchy”, a Liberty transformed by the very hand of anarchy, just like the Man, at Green Man; only this target survives as a symbol. She is 10 feet tall, displayed on a high pedestal with all of her incredible charred textures—effects not possible without the arson’s torch…will she survive be our guide in the coming era?

2. “Order”, a Liberty still in progress. She is scaffolded and far more futuristic then her counterpart, though immediately familiar. Since she is more established, she is much larger, perhaps 30 feet tall…a robust statement of an evolving freedom through reciprocal order. Will she survive to symbolize of our evolving freedom?

Situated between the two versions of Liberty will be a large, carved, inscription challenging would-be participants, with mirth and merriment, to deposit their coveted Burning Man ticket-stub into a slot, in an historic vote: Preserve the rule of order or accept the rule of anarchy.
(The exact form of voting is still being considered…one burner has suggested planting tiny flags in the playa that would shift back and forth at participants’ desecration…hmmm…)

The carved invitation is backed by a large depiction of a sculpture park currently under consideration for Nevada’s capital city. www.timelesssculptures.com/freedom.html. With community approval, the sculpture with the most votes would permanently reside in this “Freedom Plaza”, along with masterworks by many artists (some of them burners?).

Participants may ascend the scaffolds, touch the sculptures and see the process up-close, maybe talk to the artist or an apprentice. They may leave a message in marker or even carve on the still-evolving, larger Liberty. Visitors may also help with the preservation process of the anarchist-inspired, charred Liberty, slathering and rubbing her protective finish to a luster…

At a chosen time, the sculpture losing the vote will be scurried onto the playa, dangling from a crane, amid the frantic beating of drums and set on a prepared cornice, in one of the magnificent structures…to be burned in a spectacular ceremony.

To support arson recovery and project expenses, you can PayPal by entering Timeless’ address: timeless.sculptures@gmail.com

Here is some background:
Burning Man hosted, at the ’07 event, six of my large wooden sculptures, including my in-progress, 10 foot, futuristic and reverent Statue of Liberty. The installation was entitled “America Empowering the World…Again”. I spent three long months planning and carving before I arrived, artworks in tow, on the playa. The participants of Nevada’s 5th largest city, Black Rock City helped me to erect scaffolding around my Liberty and I continued my work. People bicycled around the sculptures and rode on the charming art cars, shouting words of praise and thanks for my contribution to this, the largest outdoor art gallery on the planet! They seemed in love with my Liberty… some climbed the scaffold to talk to me, admire her features and touch the wood.

News archives are replete with tales of the early arson attack on the revered Man and of the immediate perils the attack posed. The arsonist was apprehended, jailed, released on bail and posters of his mug-shot were taunting the playa before the pivotal symbol of free-expression could be hurriedly rebuilt. Within hours of the legitimate burn of the same Man, somebody dowsed the display trailer my Liberty stood on with gasoline from a generator and tossed a lit lighter-torch, in order to incinerate America’s central symbol for freedom!! Along with it went my tools, trailer and scaffolding.

In the days that followed, the burning community surrounded me with everything from hugs to meals. Everything I needed was there…ratchet straps, padding, timbers a huge truck and a forklift to rescue the remaining sculptures from the harsh playa…and plenty of hearts, backs and minds. Some even stayed behind to clean up the burn mess!

When I returned home; beleaguered, a slew of emails greeted me from concerned “burners” offering resources, legal advice, solace—and money! Soon there was a mild buzz on the internet about “the other arson at Burning Man” and $4,000 in a new PayPal account to begin replacing the 10 thousand-plus equipment loss…just in case I might want to do something at next years burn.

By now, key leadership of the burning community have asked me to submit a proposal to fund a much bigger, more futuristic version of the same iconic symbol of freedom for display at next year’s themed event—ironically, “American Dream”. (Only partial funding is available and your gift will help pay for the rest. For PayPal, please enter timeless.sculptures@gmail.com) I will display the charred Liberty (“Survivor”) with the bigger and better rendition; a Liberty for the new era. Both will serve as a visual preview and a reminder that America must now choose the future of our own Liberty...

The Burning community I know is the modern-day acropolis, complete with brilliant minds, music and masterpieces. If we believe that art has an indispensable role in the advance of freedom, then this remarkable culture with art as blood should be protected from corrosive elements.

Since the Man incident and now with Grace Cathedral Paul Addis has been riding high on a coast-to-coast media-wave and boasting about his supposed group of witless followers “Black Rock Intelligence”. He has, for now supplanted my right to free-expression and not just mine but that of many; he has imposed his own will on all of us.

I consider this domestic terrorism nothing buy a means to anarchy in the name of enlightenment. By Addis’ own account, “I’m on ur playa”... And so are his friends.

Matthew (Timeless) G. Welter; sculptor
email to: timeless.sculptures@gmail.com