Burning Man USA 2018, we created, built and brought to the playa Encrypted Data, a giand key with an encrypting device in its core, to write and give secret messages to burners.

This installation is about cryptography, secret messages and treasure hunt. The structure holds an encryption device and a whole treasure hunt game. This beacon was a meeting point, a play area and a place for deep communication between strangers and friends. The central space hosts a small electronic pad that let you write, encrypt, and print out messages. The structure also includes dozens of hidden and locked hideouts and stashes. A treasure hunt game is hidden in all these stashes, using riddles, lockpicking and hidden keys. It will induce curious folks to open more drawers, look for hints, decypher old school secret codes to unveil new stashes and find thoughtful gems and “easter eggs”. This game is designed to be played by mutiple people at once, and requires knowledge from different cultures and languages. Some steps even need to be made by two people simultaneously. This encouraged people to meet and collaborate.

Made with Benjamin Vedrenne, Alexia Schmidt and Zac Cogle.