The organizers of the cult art festival Burning Man, which has been held annually since 1986, for the first time could not sell out all the tickets. This is reported by The Guardian.
For more than ten years in a row, tickets to Burning Man sold out almost instantly, sometimes in minutes. Since 2011, tickets have been sold out in full a few weeks before the event. Moreover, the cost of participation in the cult festival starts from $ 575, but participants must bring with them almost everything they need for a week-long life in the Black Rock desert (Nevada), which significantly increases costs.
No tickets were sold out this year. Two weeks before the festival, tickets were still on sale.
Long-time festival participants refer to the difficult few years for the festival and economic uncertainty. First there were cancellations in 2020 and 2021 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Then, in 2022, there was a record heat wave, in 2023 there were long downpours that turned the festival site into liquid mud, and many participants were blocked there for several days.
"As food and shelter have become a priority, many have decided to skip a year or two to strengthen their financial situation. In addition, many of us are very fond of bringing large art objects. It is almost entirely self—financed and can cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars," said one of the organizers, Kaden Sinclair.
The festival started on August 25 and will last until September 2.
As EADaily reported, on September 3 last year, due to torrential downpours that turned the roads into sticky mud, the organizers forbade festival participants to leave the desert, new arrivals were deployed at the entrances to the site. Almost 73 thousand people were blocked in the desert. Last year's festival ended with a traffic jam that could be seen from space, and the two main events — the burning of a huge human figure and the Temple of the Heart — were postponed for almost a day.