Fire´s Laugh: An Anthropological Study on Fire´s Role in the Artistical Creation

Abstract

Fire plays a foundational role in several artistic fields, as well as in different pictorial, sculptural and graphic techniques. The igneous element accompanies the artist at the “painting kitchen”, in the carvers’ forges and it is also an essential element for a number of drawing and engraving techniques. It is the most active catalyst agent for the substantial transformations characteristic of plastic expression. In addition to this instrumental role, the meaning of fire -its symbolic and cultural implications- becomes even more relevant as we approach fire from its anthropological dimension. Greco Latin mythology, several primitive cultures, as well as the Christian tradition, use the fire to describe substantial transformations, elemental metamorphosis, nature purifications and human disasters. Fire is a spiritual and technological element, whose biggest present manifestations still remain in popular celebrations as the Fallas or Carnival celebrations. We can take fire as a metaphor of present art creation.