Festivals Are Good

Dancing to your favorite band in a sea of 100,000 people under the stars or beneath the clouds, on the grass or in the mud, is an experience like no other. This is freedom: freedom to be moved by the energy of a mass gathering, freedom to dance without restraint, freedom to surrender yourself to the moment and go where that takes you. They are happenings that mark your life. Anyone at the first Woodstock festival has surely talked about it ever since. Cheryl Dunn has been shooting music festivals for over 20 years. She shoots from the pit or from the first row for the biggest rock stars in the world, but she is also a fan. The photographs celebrate what she has seen, who she has danced with, and who she made pictures with: kids crammed front and center who saved their money for a year to be there, older people sitting on tricked-out lawn chairs whose friends think they are crazy for still going, cross sections of nerds, jocks, babes, stoners and outcasts letting it all hang out in unabashed glory, all sharing a common love of music. Festivals Are Good reveals the collective transcendence that can emerge when music lovers share common and powerful moments.