During
the month of May, the city of Bournemouth is ablaze with merry-making as people celebrate the Fire Festival. The
Fire Festival, held annually on the 12th of May at Meyrick Park, is a celebration of art and music, showcasing
fire-themed exhibits and live performances featuring a diverse mix of music. Performances will be seen at two
innovative stages that the organizers have constructed especially for the event.
Fire is the central theme of this festival and activities include artwork inspired by this element, ranging from
photography to installation art. People can view these at a huge fire art arena. There are also fire performance
groups and circus-type performers displaying their juggling acts, fire hula hoops, fire eating and other similar
performances.
The festival promises to be a thrilling event with different fire performance groups delivering brilliant
presentations. Among the groups slated to perform are FenFire UK, Combust, Brite Sparx, Trickswop, Emilia and the
local group F.LA.M.E. The best in visual fire art will also be showcased by Katie Hawker for installation art and
sculpture, RJ Fernandez, Nadja Oberdoerfer , Marcus Voss for photography, Richard Maddalena for performance art,
Katja Gless, as costume artist, Eleanor Reed for installation art, Ben Dix, whose work covers photography,
animation and film, Eamon al Nawa for mixed media art and many others.
The musical shows are a truly diversified mix of entertainment covering the genres of rock and roll, gypsy,
hoedown, blues, ska, swing, jive, hillbilly and psychobilly to name a few. Bands performing at the festival include
the Glitzy Bag Hags, Kid Carpet, Vincent Vincent and the Villain and Cut a Shine. DJs and other live musical
performances are also expected to add spice to the party scene.
Although the event revolves around the medium of fire, there are also other main attractions that it will offer.
Among them is the World Food Village and the market stalls. The World Food Village is where people can go from
stall to stall to sample cuisines from around the globe. The stalls are located in a themed dining area complete
with bands performing acoustic, skiffle and street music.
The market stalls sell all sorts of souvenir items like uniquely designed jewelry and fun circus toys. People can
also visit Eco-Arcadia, a biodiesel-fueled pinball arcade.
For those eager to explore new things, the festival also offers a number of workshops for those wanting to learn
performance art, circus skills - featuring poi and staff, hula hoop skills, workshops on developing a positive
outlook and self-care, dance, poetry, cooking and even unusual workshops like African Drumming and Didgeridoo.
Being a fire-themed celebration the festival also offers a fire safety demonstration in cooperation with the city's
fire brigade that will educate attendees about fire safety issues.
The festival promotes climate change and its proceeds go to charities that likewise promote this. The event aims to
be the first completely carbon neutral event in Dorset in keeping with its advocacy of environmental development
and thereby offers spectators information on how to reduce carbon emissions.
