A giant flaming chandelier looming over the River Liffey, 4m-high fire balls, 400 lights and 3,000 candles illuminated Dublin city at the weekend to mark the official start to the Dublin Fringe Festival.
Amid plumes of smoke and hundreds of flickering flames from "fire pots" at George's Dock, the French artistic group Compagnie Carabosse opened its first fire installation show to an Irish audience on Saturday and Sunday nights.
Director of the festival Wolfgang Hoffman said the free outdoor "poetic spectacle" before the newly-constructed "Spiegeltent" in the grounds of the IFSC had been a fitting start to a festival which boasts 116 shows over the course of 16 days.
Despite earlier concerns from Dublin City Council and Dublin Docklands Authority about the audience's close proximity to naked flames and their proposals to erect fences and barriers, the fire installation took place without incident or obstruction.
"I think for the first time we are reaching outside the arts community. My aim is to make art more relevant and not confined to the middle classes," said Mr Hoffman.
"The effect the fire installation had on people's mood was amazing. It was a very mellow, calm atmosphere enjoyed by lots of families and it succeeded in unifying different social classes."
The 45-minute theatrical ceremony of lighting the fire pots and the ensuing fire display which illuminated the quayside until after midnight was viewed by up to 2,500 people over the course of Saturday night.
Construction of the set commenced last Monday and it will now take several days to dismantle, according to production manager with Dublin Docklands Authority Garreth Neville.
"The whole point of the fire installation was to make people a part of the action. The show is about the sight, sound and smell senses. People would have been able to smell the burning wax," he said.
The festival runs from September 9th until September 24th.