It is that time of year when the earth curls into herself. Sleep reverberates in the dreams of the trees as they shed their leaves and the wheel of the year turns towards the long darkness of winter. As Burners, as dancers and as artists for many of us Autumn and the time around Halloween is sacred. As a community of magical humans we also know how deeply death is tied to rebirth.

It seems fitting then, that in days surrounding the dance of the dead, we share some exciting news for our Ontario regional Burning Man event in 2023 and welcome in a new chapter in our beloved regional burn community.

Some backstory:

As you may already know, our regional burn has been on a 3 year hiatus due to ~waves vaguely at everything~. As a still new and growing regional event (we’ve only been around since 2017 and have created three wonderful burns!), we lost some major momentum during the pandemic and some key community members who helped us make the magic happen.

During our hiatus many conversations were had with community members to hear what they love about the event but also ways that we could grow. We have heard your feedback about our Regional Event and your calls for more transparency, equality and fair process. In response, for our 2023 cycle, we have restructured what our Regional event will look like and represent.

As a community and as individuals you have bravely made a call for us to improve attendees’ safety. We listened to your stories and we accepted suggestions on how we could best accomplish this. We are proud to introduce the creation of the Community Safety Producer, a new volunteer role this year; they will be responsible for coordinating and overseeing all things that affect the participant’s safety at the event. We would also like to introduce the creation of the Equity Committee and affirm that we are revitalizing the Conduct and Consent Committee to better meet the community’s needs.

Additionally, we have learned about some problems regarding the name Hyperborea. The term and imagery relating to Hyperborean mythology have been co-oped by some segments of the white supremacist movement and we’ve noticed a trend in people linked to white supremacy trying to join our event pages (we denied them all). The team unanimously agreed that in light of this information we needed to change the name of the event.  Let us be very clear – white supremacy and any other acts of hate are not welcome or tolerated at our event.  Nazi burners fuck off.

The Growth of something new!

Henceforth; the existing Production Team and H.E.A.T Board members have amalgamated to form one new entity – “The Event Committee” also now known as FlameON.  FlameON will serve as the legal entity for our regional burn and abide by all laws and regulations of a registered non-profit organization. We are actively going through the process of the paperwork involved to make these changes with the Ministry.

The FlameON Event Committee is pleased to present the new name of our regional event:

SideBurn (formally known as Hyperborea)

We hope that you will join us for new adventures on the Haya May 18-22, 2023.

Meet The Team 

FlameON is a diverse group of creatives, makers and doers who are working passionately to help make the event happen! Currently sitting on Event Committee for SideBurn 2023 are:

Branda Dale (she/her) – President and Event Organizer

Raina Hersh (she/her) – City Producer

Celina Lucarelli (she/they) – Art Producer

Troy Strum (he/him) – Treasurer and Flow Producer

Sarah Barton (she/her) – Department of Public Works (DPW) Producer and (Acting) Secretary.  Sarah is also a Toronto Burning Man Regional Contact.

Kirsten Gelevan (she/her) – Ticketing/Tech Producer

Michelle Imai (she/her) – (part-time) Communications Producer and Conduct and Consent Committee Member.

Kelly O’Keefe (they/them) – Community Safety Producer

Owen Harris (he/him) – Equity Committee Chair

Paula Gunn (she/they) – Training Resources Chair and Conduct and Consent Committee Member.

More information about SideBurn, our new initiatives, and how YOU can get involved coming soon!

-From the FlameON Event Committee