Rich Martin
Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible.
— Richard Feynmann
I’m a designer, technologist, and mystic living on the Pacific coast. I’m here because in this place, I find the environments I love, that inspire me, and understanding what it is about these environments that touches, moves, and inspires me, and how to manifest that in a design, is the first responsibility of the designer.
I create and apply computer software, in multiple artistic media, to bring any desired art piece to life; my work is a blend of artistry, engineering, programming, design, and fabrication. Most recently, I developed an AI-driven camera system that creates the functionality of both a film and lighting crew, working together, and that can be used for telepresence and documentation applications. Before that, I worked for four years on a mesh-networked remote-sensing project designed to record wildland environmental conditions in real time. Research on that project is ongoing, as I have identified many more use cases for the technology.
I’ve found that sometimes, the projects themselves have deeper lessons to teach, and one of the ones from the sensor network project was that you know a solution is the right solution, when it turns into the gift that keeps on giving. I love developing solutions like this; that start with seemingly simple problems which step aside to reveal deep truths, on which I can create new tool sets that work with ones I’ve already created.
I think that sacred dance and performance art are magic. I have designed and built eye-catching practical props and scenery for many shows, and use lighting and my skills as a DJ to enhance the values of our offerings. I’ve designed and built large-scale environments as well, for big acts. Burning Man has been the showcase for these larger projects, which have attracted many world-class names and acts to perform in them.
I wanted to create the events with the spaces that were worthy of the people who give up so much, sometimes everything, just to be there. But...to connect. That is everything to me, and that’s why I put so much care and effort into my environmental design. A performer connecting with an audience. Audience members, connecting with one another. This is the magic of art, that it can enable connection, and is why I must use all of my skills, all of my power, to facilitate this, to make it bigger.
I’m fascinated by the role technology plays in all this, and I’m constantly developing new technological tools to make myself more effective as well as new props and scenery so that I can help others tell more stories. What I want, most of all, is to make beautiful things made of light, sound, metal, and code, with cool people, that make people happy.
I am currently working on a project that my friends and I call The Church Of The Empty Spaces. This project is bringing my entire body of work together, as well as works from other artists, to create a space where together, we can explore the common threads that unite our work and give it power and meaning. There’s a spiritual aspect here, a mystical aspect of design, when we reach into the beyond and bring back answers to pressing questions and burning need. I very much enjoy talking about technology and fabrication, and the stories that have played out along the way, but I love talking about the mystery.
