Fire Garden
FIRE GARDEN, Carabosse
Fri 11th Oct – Sun 13th Oct 2019, Market Place, Newbury and St Nicholas’ Church
In 2019 we celebrated the ten year anniversary of the outdoor arts programme in Newbury with legendary Carabosse, who filled the streets of Newbury with fire and music, enjoyed by over 12,000 people across 3 days.
When French company Carabosse came to Newbury, the market place, streets and alleyways of the town centre came alight with kinetic sculptures bringing fire, clay, metal and water together in improbable combinations.
In the market place, large metal sculptures slowly rotated, holding clay pots of fire – a double helix, and concentric circles turning in opposite directions. The burning metal petals of a flower-like structure slowly opened and closed, emitting a tall jet of water, to a hypnotic live musical soundtrack of electric guitar, male voice and loop pedal.
In a feat of balance, a metal unicyclist with a clock for a head cycled back and forth along a wire in the churchyard, high above people’s heads, holding dangling cans of fire, and fountains emitted flames and water simultaneously. Lanterns made from old white vests bedecked the Victorian shopping arcade, clay pots decked the bridges, and braziers emitting golden embers and sparks burned above the canal water.
As much alchemists as artists, Carabosse have travelled the world, never failing to enchant audiences from the very young to the very old.
