The Ploetry Project brings “Ploetry” - playa poetry – to Black Rock City. Words that inspire, excite, and of course buuurrrrnnn! But most important of all, they’re not our words, they’re YOURS.
A Ploetry installation is a wooden tower on which prose is hung, carved from planks of wood. A backlight makes the words visible night and day. Comfortable custom seating gives visitors a place to rest, contemplate, and start their own creative spark.
While poetry is free of rules, we’ve created some standards for Ploetry to create a consistent look. This way, someone walking across the playa will recognize the distinctive look of a Ploetry installation and come closer to check out the new Ploem. It’s important to understand that we try hard to not control the prose, only the visual appearance. We offer the Ploetry style to help bring more visitors to all of our works. If you don’t like this style or find it too restrictive for your work, we encourage you to express yourself the way you feel is best, and request only that you don’t build something that looks a lot like Ploetry but isn’t.
A key part of the project is continuity. We’d like every new installation to provide a means for visitors to be inspired to write their own prose on the spot, and for that the best of that prose to find its way onto future installations as the project grows. How do we define “best” when art is so subjective? We don’t – YOU do. The builder of a tower is the curator for the prose on that tower, so if you build a tower, you decide what goes on – your own prose, or someone else’s prose that you found inspiring.
The Ploetry Project does NOT plan to build many towers – just a few to get things started. All of our detailed plans are freely available on this website. We would like those folks who feel inspired to do so do use our plans and build the next tower. We do archive Ploems here, though, so if you build a tower and receive submissions (and you will!), send them along to us and they will, in most cases, appear on the website. (Although we try not to censor, we are a family-friendly site so not everything will make it on. We NEVER edit, but we may decline.)
The Ploetry Style Guide: Here are the basic style requirements for a ploetry installation:
1. The tower has 3, 4, 5, or 6 sides. One side contains an image, the others contain prose.
2. Each side may contain a ploem, or a ploem may span more than one side or take up the entire tower.
3. The image should be relevant to the poem. We do request that if your image is the Man, please use our version.
4. Ploetry should be relevant to the location or event.
5. Seating is not required but is highly recommended.
6. Engraving the name of the piece on the seating is not required but adds beauty.
7. Some means of inviting visitors to write poetry and submit it is required.
Special style rules for the panels:
1. A side consists of exactly 7 panels. The top panel may be wide or narrow, the other 6 must be wide.
2. When a ploem or stanza does not require all 7 panels, the bottom panel contains a simple image tied to the main image. When less than 6 panels are required, the others are blank.
3. Panel letters must be cut through. Painted or stuck-on letters are not permitted.
4. You may paint your panels any color(s) or leave them unpainted.
5. You may use any color(s) for the backlight, and they may be stable or change.
A few special notes:
1. The prose should be relevant to the location or event, but it doesn’t have to be about the Man or about Burning Man. I bring this up because this seemed to be a misunderstanding in the first installation, where the poem “I Am But Wood” was about the Man. We invited people to write their own prose, and it seemed apparent that a number of people thought we were only requesting further prose about the Man.
2. You can use any image you like on the extra side. We do request that if you choose the Man as your image, that you use our design for consistency.
3. Our parts spreadsheet contains every part you should need for your build. We’ve provided part numbers for McMaster-Carr, a very large online parts supplier, because they have an enormous selection and good prices, but we have no relationship with them, and every component required is very common and available from many suppliers.
A Ploetry installation is a wooden tower on which prose is hung, carved from planks of wood. A backlight makes the words visible night and day. Comfortable custom seating gives visitors a place to rest, contemplate, and start their own creative spark.
While poetry is free of rules, we’ve created some standards for Ploetry to create a consistent look. This way, someone walking across the playa will recognize the distinctive look of a Ploetry installation and come closer to check out the new Ploem. It’s important to understand that we try hard to not control the prose, only the visual appearance. We offer the Ploetry style to help bring more visitors to all of our works. If you don’t like this style or find it too restrictive for your work, we encourage you to express yourself the way you feel is best, and request only that you don’t build something that looks a lot like Ploetry but isn’t.
A key part of the project is continuity. We’d like every new installation to provide a means for visitors to be inspired to write their own prose on the spot, and for that the best of that prose to find its way onto future installations as the project grows. How do we define “best” when art is so subjective? We don’t – YOU do. The builder of a tower is the curator for the prose on that tower, so if you build a tower, you decide what goes on – your own prose, or someone else’s prose that you found inspiring.
The Ploetry Project does NOT plan to build many towers – just a few to get things started. All of our detailed plans are freely available on this website. We would like those folks who feel inspired to do so do use our plans and build the next tower. We do archive Ploems here, though, so if you build a tower and receive submissions (and you will!), send them along to us and they will, in most cases, appear on the website. (Although we try not to censor, we are a family-friendly site so not everything will make it on. We NEVER edit, but we may decline.)
The Ploetry Style Guide: Here are the basic style requirements for a ploetry installation:
1. The tower has 3, 4, 5, or 6 sides. One side contains an image, the others contain prose.
2. Each side may contain a ploem, or a ploem may span more than one side or take up the entire tower.
3. The image should be relevant to the poem. We do request that if your image is the Man, please use our version.
4. Ploetry should be relevant to the location or event.
5. Seating is not required but is highly recommended.
6. Engraving the name of the piece on the seating is not required but adds beauty.
7. Some means of inviting visitors to write poetry and submit it is required.
Special style rules for the panels:
1. A side consists of exactly 7 panels. The top panel may be wide or narrow, the other 6 must be wide.
2. When a ploem or stanza does not require all 7 panels, the bottom panel contains a simple image tied to the main image. When less than 6 panels are required, the others are blank.
3. Panel letters must be cut through. Painted or stuck-on letters are not permitted.
4. You may paint your panels any color(s) or leave them unpainted.
5. You may use any color(s) for the backlight, and they may be stable or change.
A few special notes:
1. The prose should be relevant to the location or event, but it doesn’t have to be about the Man or about Burning Man. I bring this up because this seemed to be a misunderstanding in the first installation, where the poem “I Am But Wood” was about the Man. We invited people to write their own prose, and it seemed apparent that a number of people thought we were only requesting further prose about the Man.
2. You can use any image you like on the extra side. We do request that if you choose the Man as your image, that you use our design for consistency.
3. Our parts spreadsheet contains every part you should need for your build. We’ve provided part numbers for McMaster-Carr, a very large online parts supplier, because they have an enormous selection and good prices, but we have no relationship with them, and every component required is very common and available from many suppliers.