Firework Art, the evocative art of fireworks

When the British firework industry faded in the late 1980’s it took with it one of the most fondly remembered and imaginative forms of retail art ever to grace the small shops of these isles.  The firework labels, their boxes and the posters that drew children to them like vivid magnets, faded from our high streets and corner shops just like the smoke from the fireworks they once proclaimed.

During the Twentieth Century, millions of British people celebrated the Fifth of November using shop bought fireworks.  Purchased from their local newsagents, toyshops and small corner shops, these colourful little tubes gave immense pleasure to generations of children and seared themselves both into the yearly cycle of events and into the long term memory of those who waited for their return, to the shops, each autumn.  Looking into the glass cabinets, filled with all those colourful tubes, pinwheels, bangers and rockets sparked the limitless imagination of millions of children and many an adult too.

Despite their immense popularity across the decades, the once thriving industry that worked quietly and unobserved throughout the year to supply those precious few weeks has now completely gone.  In passing is has taken with it many of the well known household names such as Astra, Brock’s, Excelsior, Lion, Rainbow, Wells’, Wizard, Wilders and Wessex.  Today, only Pain’s and Standard still remain - in name at least.  

And yet the strange thing is, despite the obvious excitement and energy of Firework Night itself, it is the shop display and the colourful label that is now more clearly remembered by most people than the fire and sparks of the fireworks themselves. The unlit firework, studied and examined in the days preceding the Fifth is more vividly recalled today than its momentary display during some damp November evening long ago. Why is this so?

It is all down to the fantastic artwork generated within the firework companies, by the unnamed designers, often the factory workers themselves.  It is they who collectively produced the wildly descriptive and evocative designs and they who dreamt the names that have so well stood the test of time. 

As the British firework industry faded, switching to today’s less imaginative imports, this annual eruption of joyful colour, spaced between the end of the summer holidays and the build up to Christmas faded too.  For over two decades these images and designs have continued to fade, becoming a fond memory; a footnote in our social and retail heritage.  Gone forever are Traffic Lights, Harlequin, Crackling Cauldron, Lightning Chaser, Aerial Bomb and the beautiful simplicity of a Snowstorm. 

Until now, that is…. 

Now their evocative imagery, madcap names and wonderful designs can be seen once more, this time in a beautiful new art book.  FIREWORK ART has taken many of the best and most memorable labels and posters and presented them for the very first time, for full appreciation.  Freed from the tubes they once decorated, the labels in particular can be seen in their full glory for the first time.  This book has immediately written itself into the long and complex history of British firework celebrations.   In the future, this book may be the only way for people to sense the colour and imagination of a lost industry and in many ways a lost way of life.

Already very well received, this art book is proving to be a wonderful resource to artists, designers, teachers and students, as well as sending many a person down memory lane.

If you wish to find out more, please look up the www.firework-art.com website which has sample images, details on the image repairs and extended text from the book.

FIREWORK ART by M.Fleming, Rumble 2005  ISBN 0-9550621-0-1
With 208 pages (297mm x 210mm) and using over 230 full colour reproductions of labels and posters, this beautiful book records in stunning detail detail the wildly imaginative and unforgettable face of British fireworks.

ASTRA, BENWELL, BROCK'S, LION, PAIN'S, STANDARD
RAINBOW, WELLS', WESSEX, WILDER'S - and others