The Cradle of “Mir” is not just a temple. It is a special place where we can see the Orbital Station and perceive it as a symbol of connection between the Earth and Space, a symbol of interaction with other worlds. “Mir” is a huge object which was observed from space for many years, and who knows, maybe, seeing it, the dwellers of other planets tried to learn something about us, to understand who and how created that thing and satellited it to the orbit of a distant planet.
“Mir” is a space station, a link between us and the space. It symbolizes the cargo ship, the last “trans-shipment point” of cargo ships which carry their load from the Earth through the future, before they exit to the vast open space.
The following questions bother us:
What kind of cargo humanity is able to send to their distant neighbors today? What does mankind consider its most impressive achievement? Art? Music? Literature? Which experience of earthlings can be of use to other civilizations?
What of our scientific discoveries would be of service to them? Perfect machines and mechanisms for killing our like? Methods of oil extraction? Or sophisticated ways to lose control and stop thinking about important things? Achievements of entertainment industry which substitute curiosity and desire to comprehend the outside world with comfort and various indulgences which are not burdensome to average people of the Earth who got tired after a 40-hour working week...
We wish to find answers to these and other questions together with the participants of the festival.
The construction represents a tetrahedral pyramid. Its height is 11 meters, while its base width is approximately 20 meters.
In the center of the pyramid, under the ceiling, there hangs the “Mir” station. It is made of wood, as if someone who saw it from the distance recreated this enigmatic object using the available materials. It keeps both the conundrum of the item from another world and the promise of connection, communication, dialogue with that world.
At daytime the pyramid is filled with fanciful shadows which fall from the carved holes in the walls. On the floor and on the walls there appear the scenes of humanity's life, versatile developmental milestones and significant cultural symbols. Some of them can be seen distinctly, while others gradually blur, change their shape, transform and then disappear.
Every participant of the festival can send to the “Mir” station a message containing the answer to the question: “What things which were made on Earth should be sent to Space, to the extraterrestrials? What important things were created by earthlings, what could be used by dwellers of other planets? What we would like to share with them?”
For this purpose a special mechanical construction will be made in the pyramid which will lift the messages upwards, inside the station.
Anyone who feels like it will be able to write his / her answer and send it to the station.
Music will form the background. It is intended to set positive moods among the participants of the festival. It will set the visitors for discussion of issues to which our installation is dedicated to.
The program will comprise works of different musicians from various periods of time and versatile cultures, musical achievements of humanity. It will be a compilation emphasizing the diversity of musical art on the planet Earth.
Samples of music: Voyager Golden Record, Across the Universe, The Beatles, Bach's Brandenburg concerto No. 2, “Gavotte en rondeau”, “Well-tempered clavier”, Beethoven's 5th symphony and string quartet No. 13, Mozart's “The Magic Flute”, Stravinsky's “The Rite of Spring”, Chuck Berry, Louis Armstrong, Blind Willie Johnson, classical music of India, Java and Japan, folk music of Peru, Bulgaria, Australia, Africa, and Georgian choral singing.
Fragments of human speech in the form of short greetings in 55 languages will also be used in the recording.
...to be continued :)
We invite journalists to cover our art project in printed media and internet, television and radio broadcasting. If you need additional information, please send us an e-mail.
We are the first Russian team to win a grant for creation of its art object at this legendary festival.
And we do it for the first time!
We need your support!
We strongly hope for your support and involvement, since it is you who give us strength and inspiration to live and create.
The grant given to us by the Burning Man festival covers building materials ONLY.
We need a serious sum of money for rental of workshops in the USA, purchase of necessary building implements, transportation of large consignments to the desert, and disposal of waste (Burning Man, like Empty Hills, sticks to the Leave No Trace policy, and the desert must remain immaculate after the festival), not to mention various expenditures related to making of a big camp in the desert.
Therefore, we created a PayPal account for The Cradle of Mir for raising funds for our project.
We will be grateful for every contribution, and promise you to send the compliments from dwellers of Empty Hills to Burning Man! :)
Tell everybody about us! We are sure that the more people believe in us, the easier we will meet all the challenges! :)
If you have acquaintances in the USA, tell them about us. We will be happy if our foreign friends can help us with tools or materials or join our crew at the festival!
In our turn, we will inform you of all the news about the preparation of the project, and hope to organize some interesting events for you in the nearest future :)
If you have any questions or want to share your insights and suggestions, write to us!