One Photographer's Look at Burning Man's Incredible Pop-Up Architecture

The Temple of Joy, a massive temporary wood structure built for the Burning Man arts festival 2002. A powerful laser beam, built by Russell Wilcox, was installed thousands of feet away across the desert floor, and aligned with an opening in the upper level of the Temple. All imagery by NK Guy from the forthcoming book Art of Burning Man.

NK Guy has spent his time wandering the desert. A prolific writer and photographer who has attended the Burning Man art festival for the last 14 years, Guy has witnessed the event's settlements coalesce and collapse over and over again, like some sort of mad mandala, blocks of installations, artwork and temporary buildings creating a unique yet ephemeral cityscape. His new book, Art of Burning Man (Taschen), documents the intricate structures that forms the backdrop to this massive event in the Black Rock Desert, which draws roughly 65,000 people annually to an empty landscape 100 miles from Reno. While there may be divided opinions on the event itself, it's arguable this is one of the biggest annual collections of pop-up architecture on the planet, including massive wooden structures that are ritually torched. Ahead of the book's release this month, and the festival's kickoff this August 30, Taschen provided a gallery of some of Guy's most insane shots.

• 
  The Temple of Transition, by the International Arts Megacrew, at the Burning Man art festival, 2011. The structure is believed to have been the largest wooden structure, without a foundation, ever built. The Burning Man temples are memorial sites for remembrance and mourning, and are burned at the conclusion of the event.
• 
  Participants gather within the Temple of Whollyness, by Gregg Fleishman, Lightning Clearwater III, and Melissa Barron, at the Burning Man art festival, 2013. The Burning Man temples are memorial sites for remembrance and mourning, and are burned at the conclusion of the event. The stone sculpture carved from black basalt by Jael La Femina.
• 
  A group of participants and their friends, rowing nowhere in a small landbound dinghy next to the Pier 2 project,by Kevan Christiaens, Matt Schultz, and the Pier Group, during the Burning Man art festival, 2012. At the end of the pier is La Llorona, a replica Spanish galleon.
• 
  Embrace, a massive wooden sculpture 70 feet tall by Kevan Christiaens, Kelsey Owens, Bill Tubman, Joe Olivier, Matt Schultz, and the Pier Group, burns at dawn during the Burning Man art festival, 2014. The work symbolizes the nature of human relationships, and was built to burn.
• 
  An aerial view of Black Rock City, the temporary city in the Nevada desert that is home to the annual Burning Man festival.
• 
  The Burning Man figure raises his arms in this 20 second long exposure. Minutes later the sculpture was deliberately burned, at the culmination of the Burning Man art festival, 2012.
• 
  The Burning Man figure, atop his massive flying saucer base designed by Lewis Zaumeyer and Andrew Johnstone, burns dramatically at the conclusion of the Burning Man art festival, 2013.