Musee Des Aster



		I propose the Disaster Museum as the BORG2 Center camp. A communal shop and Obtanium Depot. A place to share resources and ideas, to help and learn with and from eachother.

Musee is French for Museum, a Latin word, meaning House of the Muses. In classical times, a Museum would have been an art gallery, library, university and research institute. Art and science were seen as inseparable gifts of inspiration from the Muses. The Aster (asteracaea) is the largest group of flowering plants. Often called just Composites, or the sunflower family, and typified by the daisy, they are flowers composed of many repeating parts, e pluribus unum. Our museum, like so much of life in Black Rock City, is also built in this spirit of undifferentiated culture. It will be our gallery, DPW Depot, our Center Café, our shop, city hall, and most of all our College of Catastrophe. Without the risk of Catastrophe or disaster, there can be little chance of the improbable but present. Without facing these risks with courage and exhilaration, we find little that is new, always staying on the safe well trod path. Only when we step off the path and into the woods, only when we careen, barely in control, do we crash through the secret hiding places, and find the rarest gifts of creation. BORG2 is a disaster, proud and burning bright. We will build hard and improbable things, we will help others fulfill their own wild rides, help pull their dreams out of the ditch of chaos and send them back off down the slopes. We will teach and learn and share. This will be our Musee des Aster. Our house inspired by the ubiquitous composite flowers, made whole and beautiful, of many smaller parts, all joined together.

			I propose that we set up two containers as this museum. The side walls of each of these containers will be cut out, and then re hinged at the top, and stiffened along the edge with a steel channel. Placing the containers parallel and slightly less than the sum of their widths apart, will allow these two sides to be raised, and then lowered into a small I beam, which will become the peak of roof formed by the two panels. Into these containers we can place our tools and between them larger projects and art cars can be moved to be worked on.



	In a small adjacent area, will be displayed specimens of asters, mostly living, and brought by members of the community. We will classify and label the specimens and then water and care for them through out the week, just as we care for each other. Flowers, blooming and thriving on the playa are a striking and lovely thing in their contrast to the wasteland there, just as our city and our vibrant lives are more inspiring in contrast to the playa's tabla rasa. This humble little botanical display will be a symbol for our fragile lives, lived so exuberantly in that harsh place.

	BUDGET