Charles Michael "Chuck" Palahniuk is an American novelist who describes his work as transgressional fiction. He has published 19 novels, three nonfiction books, two graphic novels, and two adult coloring books, as well as several short stories. His first published novel was Fight Club, which was adapted into a film of the same title.
Burning Man is a week-long large-scale desert event focused on "community, art, self-expression, and self-reliance" held annually in the western United States. The event's name comes from its culminating ceremony: the symbolic burning of a large wooden effigy, referred to as the Man, that occurs on the penultimate night, the Saturday evening before Labor Day. Since 1990, the event has been at Black Rock City in northwestern Nevada, a temporary city erected in the Black Rock Desert about 100 miles (160 km) north-northeast of Reno. According to Burning Man co-founder Larry Harvey in 2004, the event is guided by ten stated principles: radical inclusion, gifting, decommodification, radical self-reliance, radical self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, leaving no trace, participation, and immediacy.
The Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit educational and professional organization based in San Francisco, California, with more than 1,500 members and 21 chapters across the United States and Asia. The current president is Washington Post reporter Nicole Dungca. The executive director is Naomi Tacuyan Underwood.
SantaCon is an annual pub crawl in which people dressed in Santa Claus costumes or as other Christmas characters parade in hundreds of cities around the world. The event has sometimes been characterized by drunken behavior, sparking community resistance.
Survival Research Laboratories (SRL) is an American performance art group which pioneered the genre of large-scale machine performance. Founded in 1978 by Mark Pauline in San Francisco the group is known in particular for performances where custom-built machines, often robotic, compete to destroy each other. The performances, described by one critic as "noisy, violent and destructive", are noted for visual and aural cacophony created by the often dangerous interactions of the machinery. SRL's work is related to process art and generative art.
The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence (SPI), also called Order of Perpetual Indulgence (OPI), is a charitable, protest, and street performance movement that uses drag and religious imagery to satirize issues of sex, gender, and morality and fundraise for charity. In 1979, a small group of gay men in San Francisco began wearing the attire of Catholic nuns in visible situations using camp to promote various social and political causes in the Castro District.
Larry Harvey was an American artist, philanthropist and activist. He was the main co-founder of the Burning Man event, along with his friend Jerry James.
The Suicide Club was a secret society in San Francisco, which lasted from 1977–82. It is credited as the first modern extreme urban exploration society, and also known for anarchic group pranks. Despite its name, the club was not actually about suicide. Rather the club focused on people facing their fears and engaging in daring experiences.
Redding Regional Airport, formerly Redding Municipal Airport, is 6 mi southeast of Redding in Shasta County, California, United States. It is one of two airports in Redding, along with Benton Airpark. In addition to general aviation, the airport has scheduled passenger flights nonstop to and from Los Angeles (LAX) and San Francisco (SFO) on United Express Canadair CRJ200, CRJ700 and Embraer 175 regional jets, and Alaska Airlines Embraer 175 service to Seattle (SEA).
Art of Bleeding was a Los Angeles–based multi-media performance troupe providing darkly comic, faux-educational programs in first-aid and safety at clubs, galleries and art events. Staging shows from an actual ambulance, The Art of Bleeding creates what their press release refers to as a "paramedical funhouse" wherein puppets and costumed characters interact with a crew of nurses wearing medical-themed fetish gear. Events are hosted by costumed characters reminiscent of children's programming including the company's "beloved mascot," Abram the Safety Ape and RT, the Robot Teacher. In their performances and web videos, the group promotes an ill-defined and intentionally cryptic metaphysical doctrine that they call "True Safety Consciousness."
bianca.com, informally known as Bianca's Smut Shack, was an online community created on February 14, 1994, by a group of dot-com software developers. Originally based in Chicago, the group later moved to San Francisco and included David Thau and Chris Form Miller. bianca was one of the web's first 500 content creations and was the world's first web-based chat room. It later also became a popular theme camp at the Burning Man festival.
Richard Gregory Tuck was an American political consultant, campaign strategist, advance man, and political prankster.
The Brides of March is an annual event that takes place in San Francisco, California, US and other cities around March 15. Started by the Cacophony Society, the event's name is a pun on the term Ides of March, and is a parody of weddings in western culture. The event, which began in 1999, is part pub crawl and part street theater while wearing a thrift store wedding dress.
The Acid Tests were a series of parties held by author Ken Kesey primarily in the San Francisco Bay Area during the mid-1960s, centered on the use of and advocacy for the psychedelic drug LSD, commonly known as "acid". LSD was not made illegal in California until October 6, 1966, under Governor Ronald Reagan’s administration.
John Law is an American artist, culture-jammer, and neon sign technician. He was a primary member of the Cacophony Society and a member of the Suicide Club. He is also a co-founder of Burning Man which evolved out of the spirit of the Cacophony Society when a precursor solstice party was banned from San Francisco's Baker Beach and merged with another Cacophony event on the Black Rock desert in Nevada. Originally from Michigan, Law has lived in San Francisco, California since 1976, and has maintained the signage and clock face of the Tribune Tower in Oakland, where he also has an office, since 1996.
The California Rare Fruit Growers, Inc. (CRFG) is a non-profit organization of rare exotic fruit enthusiasts, hobbyists and amateur horticulturists based in California. The CRFG, founded in 1968, promotes rare fruits in the Southern California marketplace, according to a 1997 article in the Seasonal Chef online newsletter. As of 2008 the CRFG has 3,000 members in approximately 35 countries with 20 Chapters in Western US.
Fight Club is a 1996 novel by Chuck Palahniuk. It was Palahniuk's first published novel, and follows the experiences of an unnamed protagonist struggling with insomnia. The protagonist finds relief by impersonating a seriously ill person in several support groups, after his doctor remarks that insomnia is not "real suffering" and that he should find out what it is really like to suffer. The protagonist then meets a mysterious man named Tyler Durden and establishes an underground fighting club as radical psychotherapy.
Scott Beale is an American cultural curator, photographer, documentarian and social media expert who founded Laughing Squid, a blog about art, culture and technology and a web hosting company. He is New York City based.
The Sepulveda Unitarian Universalist Society is a Unitarian Universalist church in Granada Hills, Los Angeles, California; holding services the 2nd and 4th Sundays of each month at 17622 Chatsworth St.
Desert Siteworks was an event held on the Black Rock Desert for three years (1992-1994). Participants built art and participated in self-directed performances.
