Burning Man Announces 2025 Theme Following Urgent Calls for Community Support
Burning Man has recently intensified efforts to secure additional funding, prompting speculation among community members regarding the festival’s future. In response, the organization behind the annual arts event in Nevada‘s Black Rock Desert has unveiled the theme for 2025: Tomorrow Today.
Since 1995, veteran burner Stuart Mangrum, who first attended in 1993 and introduced the event’s inaugural theme, Good and Evil, in 1995, has generated new themes to inspire the multitude of artists and performers contributing to the temporary city. In an article for the Burning Man Journal, he articulates that the 2025 theme serves as an “invitation to envision the future in fresh ways, and to manifest it through our collective efforts.”
“In the vibrant spirit of the previous century’s world fairs, which not only celebrated scientific advancements but also cultural interchange and artistic brilliance, the 2025 gathering in Black Rock City will highlight Burning Man’s global culture of creativity and innovation,” Mangrum elaborates. “It will serve as a platform for us to dream, invent, prototype, and share our most innovative ideas for the future.”
Accompanying Mangrum’s insights is artwork by Mike Hampton, depicting three aircraft soaring into the sky alongside Burning Man elements like lanterns suspended from wooden structures, as well as the iconic effigy and retrofuturistic artifacts. Hampton drew inspiration from the Burning Man art vehicle Disco Space Shuttle, the Oakland art collective Five Ton Crane, and renowned Burning Man Temple creator David Best.
Last month, Burning Man Project CEO Marian Goodell disclosed the organization needs to double its year-end fundraising goal to $20 million due to lower-than-anticipated ticket sales for 2024. Shortly thereafter, in a message that first appeared in Burning Man’s The Jackrabbit Speaks newsletter, Goodell chose to employ more urgent language, stating, “Now is the time to ensure that Burning Man can continue into the future — not merely as an annual event in the desert, but as a cultural institution that will thrive for decades, empowering future generations to reimagine their world.”
Burning Man 2025 is scheduled for August 24-September 1, 2025. For further details, visit the official event website.
