Description:

Nothing new can emerge without first a coming together. Creation - in all of its infinite forms - requires an encounter: of people, of materials, of ideas. Everything was born of relations - of chemistry and community, of labor and love. Every single thing.

This simple truth poses important questions: if everything is born from a cauldron of relations — from whence comes the spark? And might not some types of relations prove more an obstacle to creativity than its fertile soup? Answers to these questions could in turn help us to answer perhaps the most important question of all: How can we create a more creative world?

On Thursday August 30, 2012, TEDxBlackRockCity seeks to investigate the nature of creativity and possibilities of its fluorescence.

Black Rock City — or Burning Man — the largest intentional community on earth, and one of the world’s most vibrantly creative places, will provide an especially powerful setting for this investigation. On its most basic level, TEDxBlackRockCity will provide a stage for some of Burning Man’s most visionary inhabitants to speak about their ideas and their creations. On a deeper level, it will draw on the very values of Burning Man, whose Ten Principles (radical inclusion, gifting, de-commodification, radical, self-reliance, radical self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, leaving no trace, participation, and immediacy) will provide touchstones for the speakers in their talks.

Indeed, it is in the spirit of three of these Principles: Inclusion, Communality and Participation, that TEDxBlackRockCity aims to be more than merely a staged performance. For it is intended, above all, to foster creativity among all of its remarkable participants — both on stage and off — drawing on the uniquely dynamic community of Burning Man to concoct an exemplar of that fertile soup churning with creative sparks.

TEDxBlackRockCity will take place on August 30, 2012 at 1PM, located at Play)A(Skool —9:45 & Esplanade.