Burning Man co-founder Larry Harvey dies aged 70

Larry Harvey, a co-founder of the Burning Man festival, has died. He was 70.

The Burning Man Project chief executive, Marian Goodell, said Harvey died on Saturday morning at a hospital in San Francisco. He suffered a stroke on 4 April.

Harvey created Burning Man on a San Francisco beach in 1986, later moving the annual event to the Black Rock Desert in Nevada.

As many as 70,000 people from around the world now flock to a dry lakebed 100 miles east of Reno every August for what has become a weeklong celebration. Attendees are encouraged to build a community and pursue whatever interests them, while respecting one another.

At the celebration’s conclusion, a towering wooden effigy is burned to the ground.