From an interview with fire sculptor Ariel James:
"This is literally how Maquette for the Sun got started — I had this concrete ball in my studio, I kicked it, rolled it outside, poured some lighter fluid on it, and lit it. I was feeling that if I didn't do something right then, I was going to go absolutely insane. It caught the lawn on fire, I got in all kinds of trouble 'cause it was on campus. And I (looked at it and) thought, 'Man, can you believe that?'
The first thing I did — after I was done getting in trouble — was go do it again, and I spent the next three months learning how to control that . . .
(Creating art) is kind of like when you hear a song for the first time, and it hits you when you're in the perfect mood for that song. The music and the lyrics somehow relate to you at that point in your life, and the first idea you have is that you have to share it with somebody. It's like that feeling, but I have to share it with everybody. This thing is so incredible, so amazing, I want you to see it, and you to see it, and I want all your friends to see it, and that guy that I don't like to see it. It's like this drive to go grab somebody and show them . . . And then there's certainly the reward when they do see the work, and I see them reach that state where 50 people are standing in silence. Then I start wondering what they're thinking, and at the same time, I have my own thoughts. There is so much that is attractive about it, the question, ('Why do you do it?') almost loses its meaning because there are too many answers."