The Blight - Photography by Neil Girling   

Folsom Street Fair presents one with an inundation of hairy men, sweaty leather, and exposed cock-ring-adorned penises.

These are not the photos you will find here.

It is to this bastion of sexual excess that we, the purveyors of modesty, bring forth the Prim Queer Tea. Brought to life by Nifer (of NifNak fame) Colin and Slim in 2007, this year saw a much expanded turnout with a number of fine folk who had heard tale of our special breed of tomfoolery and saw fit to join us. (Slim, you brought your Mother. To Folsom. This entertains me to no end.)

Under the mantra of “Modesty is the New Kink,” Edwardian couture was doffed, cucumber finger sandwiches consumed, and healthy quantities of piping hot Earl Grey imbibed (especially the “stout” variety (that means spiked with rum, for those of you who didn’t catch that). Truly, an event like Prim Queer Tea in the middle of Folsom is a matter of inevitability. With the extremity of, well, extremities on display already at the Fair, one is left with little option but to go as far as possible in the completely opposite direction. And Folsom Street Fair is an event we would all like to enjoy and participate within, but it for the most part has gone off the deep end of classlessness. It is therefore our sacred duty to provide what little we can.

The gallery is here. Milk and sugar?

Not for the squeamish! See the photo gallery here.

Thursday night at the DNA Lounge was a sideshow-themed event called “Displayed Labors,” featuring a myriad of performances potentially distressing for the faint of heart. From Australia came special guests world-record winning sword-swallower The Space Cowboy and aerial artist Electric Dollhouse; the suspension was by Chi Kitty Andy, and the beautiful peacock-feather pierced belle (pictured above) is Courtney Crimson; from Bootie Mashup Derby we had Trixxie Carr; other burlesque by Devilla de Dallas and AZANA; live music by Cloud Archive and nes one; and DJs Siren, Random Intent and Sleepyhead with Mimosa. The ambient dancers scattered about were the Lusty Lady girls.

Other performances included half-naked girls burning themselves with showers of sparks from steel plates on their bodies, cast by angle grinders; “What’s in my Pants?” a game that did indeed involve a kitty fetus, as well as a cow tongue and lucky charms; contact juggling by Isaac and Tyler, who later did a bed-of-nails and cinder block breaking routine (also painful, they inform me); a trapeze performance by the ethereal wraith-like Gretchen; and burlesque involving buckets of fake blood, intestines pulled from panties and a real heart from the bra (it made an entertaining “squishsplat” sound when it hit the stage – and Chi Kitty put it in his pocket. Kids these days).

One bit of drama occurred when an audience member pulled two peacock feathers — and attached needles — out of Courtney’s back during her performance. From my vantage point at the back, it was hard to see, but it looked like in turn the perpetrator’s head got smacked into the stage. Then in trying to deal with the girl who pulled the needles out, a security guard got stabbed in the hand twice and the back once (with someone else’s now bloody needles). The DNA Lounge handles it all very professionally; who knows what that girl was thinking. Courtney then took it as inspiration (I suppose) and proceeded to yank out the rest of the feathers (hence all the blood). To quote her backstage, lying bloody and nearly naked on a padded table: “It’s easier than dancing burlesque.”

Congratulations to Mike and Shannon Vau de Vire, for it was their nineteenth (!!!) anniversary. They are two of the most fabulously hard-working and dedicated people I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with.

Working in the San Francisco underground leads one to encounter an array of unusal performances.  I first met Andi when he joined us (that being Vau de Vire Society) at the Exotic Erotic Ball with Peaches last year (they stiffed us a considerable sum of money, those bastards). They then asked me to attend the opening of the Phoenix Grounds (caution: more blood and hooks) gallery, a venue which unfortunately lasted but a week. And to those who wonder (it’s an exceedingly frequently asked question): yes, it hurts. However, the endorphin rush is said to be incredible (I wouldn’t know…), so much so in fact that I’ve seen performers completely out of it because they were so overwhelmed by the feeling.

You can find a new collection of some of my better images over here. Images therein were shot from 2006-2008 (with one exception dating from 2003). The criterion for their selection is an entirely subjective one: they’re images I like.

Next up, to continue the theme of ubiquity: find me on Twitter.

The first flipbook here is of the Man burning a few hours late Saturday night — the burn itself was delayed due to high winds, which is why you see the fireworks streaking off to the right.

The Burn — Burning Man 2008 from MrNightshade on Vimeo.

The second video is from one of my favorite moments at Burning Man, the DPW Parade. Slim of the DPW was camped with us; as he was leaving camp early Saturday afternoon, he stopped in mid-step, turned and looked at me and said only: “DPW Parade?” My response was to grab my gear (dumping the spare lenses and such) and ran after him. It was epic.

DPW Parade — Burning Man 2008 from MrNightshade on Vimeo.

I am fascinated by image creation; in supermarket lines, I analyze the portraits to see how they were lit — did you know you can see the photographer’s lights (and sometimes the photographer himself) in the reflection in the models’ eyes? We’re so used to simply looking at photographs we forget that there is at least one other person in that room, holding the camera; sometimes there are a half-dozen, moving lights, assembling wardrobes, holding reflectors, doing makeup, and the like. But these are not the kind of photos I take.

Mine are of action: what you don’t see in my images is the crowd to my left and right that I’ve (sometimes rudely (sorry…)) elbowed out of the way, or that I’m balanced precariously atop speaker equipment trying desperately not to accidentally unplug something (hasn’t happened yet) and so on, firing off dozens and dozens of frames in the hopes that one will turn out. What you, the viewer, end up getting is the finished product. Perhaps I’ve cropped out some of the crowd whom I couldn’t get in front of, and you usually don’t see the wires I’m most certainly not unplugging with my boot or camera bag. What you also don’t see is the motion, the raw visceral feel for what’s going on in that image.

As a photographer, I distill/condense/integrate four dimensions into two, squashing three-dimensional space over time into a two-dimensional rectangle; a fraction of a second (never instantaneous, mind you), a sliver of history, now frozen in time. Stills, however, while having the potential to be absolutely iconic, lack movement (by definition); the best they can do is imply it, through motion blur and streaks of light. But as I edit these, moving rapidly back and forth between a series of shots, I get a glimmer of what happened at that moment, a window back into that fourth dimension (that’s time, folks).

Amira spinning flags at the Regionals soiree, Burning Man 2008

It is that glimmer that I try to bring you here. Perhaps you’ll find these as amusing as I do. Perhaps they’ll help tell a story that you didn’t have otherwise, so you can see the dust blow, the wind howl, the flames spit forth. You’ll see expressions change on peoples’ faces as they interact with that otherwise unseen person in the room (by this I mean me), and interesting to some of you, you can see the thought process behind how I develop a shot from the initial “oh, that’s interesting” to “but how do I look at it in an interesting manner.” And that’s why I stare at those otherwise trashy magazines while I wait in line, trying to figure out how they made the shot and what they were thinking when they composed it (and sometimes, what were they thinking…)

The Wheel of Thwarted Ambition at Burning Man 2008

Check back in the coming days for further installments — I have about a dozen such flipbooks in the works.

See the gallery here.

This past Friday saw the latest installment of San Francisco’s underground circus extravaganza, Bohemian Carnival. Hosted by Gooferman and Vau de Vire Society, special guests included our frequent cohorts, the inimitable Fou Fou Ha!, Keno Mapp (and his album release) acrobatic pole-dancer extraordinaire Blaze from Portland, and Vau de Vire’s periodic co-conspirators, the Dr. Madd Vibe Orchestra (fronted by Angelo Moore of Fishbone).

It was an excellent show. If you didn’t make it, why not? You missed out. Our next installment should be in a few months.

See the gallery here.

Last night I was brought in to cover the Scottish post-rock band Mogwai at a sold-out show by Golden Voice at the Regency Center ballroom in San Francisco (a decadent place of marble and turn-of-the-century chandeliers). Composers of long melodic guitar-based pieces almost completely without vocals, Mogwai is not a band to which you pound your head out –  the mood of the crowd was subdued (I heard audience members hush one another) — though they were certainly a fan of suddenly snapping the crowd to attention by breaking a long quiet interlude with a blast of sound and strobes so bright they warmed the audience (and blinded me through my viewfinder).

Having heard their name many times before, I still had not yet heard any of their music before coming to the show; but to a new listener, they did not disappoint.

This gallery will be updated soon, as what you see here went up the same night as the show itself.

Everyone asks me, “how was your Burn?” as if a single answer would suffice and provide a neat package so we could move on and change the conversation, like two people passing in the hall asking how each other is doing: “Good,” “good,” they say, without even slowing.

Such niceties are in no way sufficient for Burning Man — if you want to ask me how it was, you’ll need to narrow it down to a day, or better yet, perhaps one-half of any given day: then I can give you a “good,” or perhaps a “stellar,” “horrible,” “mind-blowing,” “wretched,” or the like. For I guarantee I could use each of these and many more to accurately summarize my experience this year. But to put it succinctly?

Absolutely fantastic.

Last year was quite wretched indeed for me: I had caught cold just before arriving, was horribly stressed out both with work and a nasty situation where I had to threaten legal action to a (former) friend, and coupled with that I was leaving early (missing the burn itself). The result of which was that I never felt that I had arrived, floating through the event and disappearing like a ghost. I was not pleased with the work I created, and barely had a good time. Clearly, I was doing it wrong. (Some images didn’t suck, however.)

This year, I did it right. I was with my friends in a tight-knit camp with lots of real-estate and know-how, who made food and built shade when I wilted in the sun or disappeared for hours to go shoot. I arrived early, relatively stress-free (as relaxed as anyone who likes to be super-prepared can be pre-burn…) and utterly without incident (thanks, Evan!). I had the support of one member of BM senior staff who lent me space in her trailer and her computer that could grab a wifi connetion (thanks a ton, miss Bex).

Some highlights?

The Wheel of Thwarted Ambition, a metal cage wheel with a wood fire inside that, when spun, showered embers across the night sky. It was a simple concept brilliantly executed.

Taking over for David Best this year, Shrine, and a crew of architects (including TukTuk) built the Temple, Basura Sagrada. It was an extraordinarily beautiful piece, made from over 90% found and recycled materials (hence “Sacred Trash”). You may recognize a similarity to the Tasseograph Trash Tea Temple from last year — it is by the same artist.

The DPW Parade during Saturday’s dust storm was a page out of Mad Max, and a hilariously epic good time with a ton of incredibly intelligent, creative people who love drinking Pabst and whisky while yelling at hippies. That, and they do amazing work in brutal conditions. From the DPW and Man Crew, SF Slim had, in the height of coincidence, set his gear down within the very boundaries of my camp (before anyone from Fandango village had even arrived) after they made him move from his temporary camp under the man (his home while they built it). He was quickly assimilated into the Blight and made a fantastic addition, and it was he who invited me out on the DPW Parade at the last minute: I grabbed my gear and ran. (I have your leather jacket, by the way).

Thursday at dawn at the temple is traditionally the White Procession, a solemn gathering of folk all in white to greet the new day at a sacred place. Anastazia (Bad Unkl Sista) had informed me she intended to do a performance; I was there and lo and behold, she did appear with a beautiful, dark and heavy butoh piece. However, I’m certainly one to appreciate irony, so when I spied a group of Pabst-swilling, song-singin’, Confederate flag wavin’ rednecks, and saw they were the White Trash Procession, I couldn’t help but laugh and split my shooting and attention between Anastazia and serious and the white trash and ridiculous. I don’t believe either detracted from the other; in fact, I think each helped emphasize and accentuate due to the extreme contrast (had they been actively interrupting, there would have been trouble). They were not fifty feet apart. It was definitely my day’s moment of zen.

Watching Farktronix (Sugar Shot!) and Evan (“Little Person”) with my friend Star channel Laurel and Hardy and take over the Red Eye Diner Tuesday night because no one was manning it and, apparently, the diner’s neighbors wanted grilled cheese. Little did they know what they were getting themselves into. The best part? A line of forty people out front who had no idea we were in no way affiliated with the diner. (To anyone from Red Eye who reads this: perhaps it’ll explain where all your cheese went…). Who wants a fuckin’ sugar shot?

Finally, showing up to the Dust City Diner late one night, and not fifteen seconds after stepping up to the bar, Kendra — one of the waitresses — calls out, “Is anyone here a photographer? We need a photo taken” and having my (rather large) camera being set down on the counter met with cheers. (It’s not often us photographers get cheered — ours is a background kind of work, appreciated (sometimes) much later). It was serendipitously awesome.

There are an infinite number of vignettes not told here, many good, some bad — for it wouldn’t be Burning Man without them, sometimes minutes apart. Am I glad to be out of the dust, heat, and wind? Yup. (I like showering at least daily, thankyouverymuch). Am I glad to have my life back for a while, all my spare time not eaten with a thousand projects and massive logistical undertakings, preparing for the apocalypse? Good lord, absolutely. Am I looking forward to next year? Damned right I am (though my camera may not be — see below. Thanks for Martin for the photo).

If you haven’t already, see my entire gallery here — 344 out of 3,116 photos (that’s 38GB, folk). You may feel free to blog my images (give credit as “Mr. Nightshade, theblight.net”) and link back to the gallery; I’d also be happy to sell you a print, or license for publication — contact me and we’ll work something out.

Just after I finished my Burning Man gallery I hear two gunshots very loud right outside my window; then two gentlemen sprint down the street, a motorcycle guns it down the street, followed soon by a big black SUV with engine roaring.

The below is what resulted: a man, shot in the head, three doors down from me.

This was shot from my window.

And this from the center of the street outside my door.

Not quite the update you expected, eh? I’ll make the full post about BM photos tomorrow; they’re online now if you look.

UPDATE: Turns out the man was the leader of the SF chapter of Hell’s Angels, and he did not survive the incident. I sure hope this doesn’t make this the epicenter for a gang war…

The Man burned as planned Saturday night, albeit a bit late, and there was doubt it could occur at all, the winds were so bad. The week began and ended in dust, with another day of choking whiteout to serve as a bookend to a week of otherwise fabulous weather. You never think of the weather as being so important as it is when you can’t escape from it, and the all-encompassing wind, heat, rain, cold, and dust dictates the mood and temper of the city.

Sparkling pyrotechnics like fireflies drift out of the man towards the end of his life Saturday night.

Just before we departed on the (somewhat infamous) DPW Parade through Black Rock City.

This year’s DPW Parade was the first to occur in a whiteout, some said. We were stuck for over an hour at some points — thank goodness for the generous donations of Pabst and whiskey.

It is late, and well past time for me to drag myself to bed (but not after a shower I’m very excited to take)

Your humble narrator in the Commissary just after returning from Saturday’s DPW Parade.

More updates and photos tomorrow. Signing off for now…