The (re)Birth of Tragedy: My Weekend at Further Future
“There is an infinite number of points on the periphery of the circle of science, and while we have no way of foreseeing how the circle could ever be completed, a noble and gifted man inevitably encounters, before the mid-point of his existence, boundary points on the periphery like this, where he stares into that which cannot be illuminated. When, to his horror, he sees how logic curls up around itself at these limits and finally bites its own tail, then a new form of knowledge breaks through, tragic knowledge, which, simply to be endured, needs art for protection and as medicine.”
— Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
It’s 6:14am in the Las Vegas airport and a refreshingly friendly TSA agent is publicly fondling my balls. He remains unfazed when discovering my lack of underwear. While it’s tempting to blame the terrorists, being selected for “additional screening” is totally my fault. I lost my drivers license while dancing/camping at Further Future, which (according to The Guardian) is “Burning Man for the 1%”:
“This weekend, outside Las Vegas, a group of Burning Man veterans put on a festival called Further Future, now in its second year. Across 49 acres of Native American land over three days, with around 5,000 attendees, the event was the epitome of a new trend of so-called “transformational festivals” that are drawing technologists for what’s billed as a mix of fun and education.”
Anyway, the agent enthusiastically confesses to losing his ID back while serving overseas: “Some Vietnamese man is probably using my ID to sneak into a titty bar!” I try to laugh but cannot muster the energy. He wipes my bag for explosives and says, “I know this sucks, but it’s not a tragedy.” That — however — gets me to chuckle.
Because if I’ve learned anything from a weekend of dressing up in crazy costumes in the desert, it’s that art is inevitably tragic (i.e. frustrating). We can rage against the present by dreaming of a utopic future, but nature will find a way to cripple our expectations, even (perhaps especially) if privy to the expectations of the 1%. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t set our expectations as high as fucking possible.
“[The Greek’s] two deities of art, Apollo and Dionysos, provide the starting-point for our recognition that there exists in the world of the Greeks an enormous opposition, both in origin and goals, between the Apolline art of the image-maker or sculptor and the imageless art of music, which is that of Dionysos. These two very different drives exist side by side, mostly in open conflict, stimulating and provoking one another to give birth to ever-new, more vigorous offspring in whom they perpetuate the conflict inherent in the opposition between them, an opposition only apparently bridged by the common term ‘art’ — until eventually, by a metaphysical miracle of the Hellenic ‘Will’, they appear paired and, in this pairing, finally engender a work of art which is Dionysiac and Apolline in equal measure: Attic tragedy”
— Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
I was first exposed to Nietzsche’s dichotomy of tragedy in a college aesthetics seminar, where we spent weeks debating whether such dichotomy even exists:
“Does rational thought (Apollo) stand opposed to chaos/emotion (Dionysus)?”
Conclusion: like most dichotomies, probably not. But we must admit that dichotomies are useful when we’re trying to explain the importance of balance. So when Nietzsche seeks to understand the birth of “tragedy,” he’s not using the word in a way we use it today (sad art) but rather acknowledging that great art is inevitably sad because it must confront the limits of human logic. This is what Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides were doing when they incorporated the Greek chorus with grand plot devices such as Mimesis and Catharsis. Basically: they made theater into a party where we confront our mortality.
Which brings me to this point: in my experience, there is no greater modern demonstration of this image/music dichotomy than the “transformational festival,” of which Further Future aspires to be. From their website:
In my opinion, Further Future succeeds at asking the right questions. Yes, it’s pretentious AF. But both sides of the 1% argument take themselves too seriously. I brought my own booze and split a tent with a buddy — this festival was not more expensive than the dozens of others I’ve attended (including Burning Man). There were a few logistical issues (including an epic rainstorm) but my friends and I experienced moments of incredible joy and fulfillment.
Still, let’s be real… this is just a festival! Nothing can be “transformational” without ridiculous expectations. So I fucking turned my ridiculous expectations into reality. Here’s a completely random rundown of my weekend:
- Dance, dance, dance, dance, dance, drink, dance, dance, dance, dance, drink, dance, dance, drink, drink.
- Stare through tinted frames at a couple giggling behind a boulder as a security guard — unaware of their presence — takes a wiz just a few feet away.
- Walk in on a group of 4 strangers getting handjobs in a tent that looked like mine (but wasn’t)
- Chug fireball in a GIANT circle with some of my favorite party people from NYC
- Get frustrated with how reliant I am on my phone and leave it in the tent for two days
- Hear Pharcyde play and turn to my buddy saying, “After 24 hours of deep house I had no idea how much I needed hip-hop.”
- Stumble into a hut at dawn, where three fellow ravers are DJing a bright disco set, then we try to reenact “Dirty Dancing”
- Sit down with an Argentinian sculpture artist who’s struggling to break into the US market to sell her work
- Paint our fraternity letters in an interactive art space
- Try to hear Darren Aronofsky speak but when he doesn’t show, rumors start swirling that he’s “busy experimenting with mushrooms”
- Build an impromptu dance floor from salvaged wood crates across a river of mucky rainwater (pretty sure this is where I lost my ID)
- Make out with a dude in the mud for like 5 seconds then we can’t stop laughing so we go back to dancing
- Finally consume five pieces of miraculous avocado toast (after eating nothing but almonds and booze for ~48 hours)
However, the majority of my time is spent sidestepping at the back of myriad dance floors with one arm in the air, miming tiny concentric waves with my hand in a half-fist (these are my happiest moments).
But then on Sunday afternoon I meditate on my own at sunset, and gain a mindfulness for how silly we must look — prancing around the desert like our ancestors have for thousands of years without really knowing why (this is my saddest moment).
And that’s when it hits me: I felt WAY out of balance, constantly jolting between dancing/drinking (Dionysus) and discussion/thinking (Apollo).
In the end, I couldn’t seem to connect my expectations. Yes, it felt GOOD to let myself go emotionally (Dionysus) and become totally anonymous, like a masquerade. But then I’d want to capture the incredible beauty of these moments for Instagram, or ask a stranger about her intellectual journey (Apollo), and my anonymity would all fall apart.
This is certainly not the fault of Further Future. Perhaps I’ve become jaded to these types of experiences? Or maybe — as I near the “mid point of existence” — my logical expectations for an ambitious festival can no longer be met?
I certainly hope not.
Still, the experience of being truly out of balance — exposing oneself to the joys & dangers of freely swinging between tragic extremes — is 100% more valuable than sunrise yoga or a bougie TED talk. Confronting such an ancient dichotomy is reminder that routines of “everyday life” keep us sane and balanced. Making a decent breakfast and commuting to work might not be “art,” but there is still joy to be found in excellently achieving the mundane.
And that’s why I’ll definitely be back for Further Future next year (with plans to contribute instead of merely spectate). And with the added wisdom to be more wary of the ancient balance of tragic (ahem… “transformative festival”) power.
