Larry Harvey, Burning Man festival co-founder, dies at 70

Jim Urquhart | Reuters

The Man dominates the playa during the Burning Man 2015 “Carnival of Mirrors” arts and music festival in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada, August 31, 2015.

The co-founder of the “Burning Man” festival has died. He was 70.

Burning Man Project CEO Marian Goodell says Larry Harvey died Saturday morning at a hospital in San Francisco. The cause was not immediately known but he had suffered a stroke on April 4.
Harvey created Burning Man on a San Francisco beach in 1986, later moving the annual event to Nevada’s Black Rock Desert.

As many as 70,000 people from around the world now flock to a dry lakebed 100 miles (161 kilometers) east of Reno every August for what has become a weeklong celebration.

During that week people are encouraged to build a community and pursue whatever interests them, while respecting one another.

At the celebration’s conclusion a towering wooden effigy is burned to the ground.