Burning Man 2012: Revellers at Nevada's Black Rock City Desert [PHOTOS]

Revellers at the Burning Man 2012 festival continue to brave high temperatures, searing winds and waves of dust at the Black Rock Desert in northwestern Nevada as the week-long annual event draws to a close.

The area is known as "The Playa" during the festival and the campers in eccentric costumes set elaborate art installations ablaze.

The event dates back to 1986, when Larry Harvey, Jerry James and a few friends lit a bonfire on a San Francisco beach to mark the summer solstice.

The event has since moved to the Black Rock Desert, where it takes place over the week leading to the US Labor Day holiday weekend. It has become dedicated to community, art, self-expression and self-reliance. The burning of wooden effigies, elaborate costumes and eccentric art installations are part of the ritual.

The event is organised by Black Rock City, a company led by Harvey, and will close on the first Monday of September, when the revellers abandon the place after a week of celebration without leaving "any trace whatsoever", one of the core beliefs of the event.

The theme of this year's festival is "Fertility 2.0" in honour of the female form and other artistic expressions of dance and music. Over 60,000 people from across the world are thought to have visited the sold-out festival.

A 50-foot tall wooden installation called Anubis was set ablaze as the event was coming to a close and hundreds of people danced around the remains of the effigy.

Scroll through the best pictures from the Burning Man festival: