Magic 1400s-1950s, the Aesthetics of Illusionism and Stage Magic
The posters that advertised prestidigitation from the 1400's through 1950s have the ability to astonish us as if we were children; Taschen made a valuable document of this.
The powerhouse Taschen, renowned for its beautiful, elegant art books, published in 2009 a graphic compendium of the history of magic. Magic 1400s-1950s features over five hundred years seen through posters, photographs, postcards, pamphlets and other visual tools that gather popular mysticism and metaphysics for the delight of its readers.
One of Taschen undeniable attributes has been its use of creativity not only on the overall design but also, and perhaps more importantly, while choosing the subjects of each and every one of their books, at times taking fairly uncommon risks for the industry ––like in Fetish Girls by Eric Kroll or Bondage by Nobuyoshi Araki. This book about stage magic follows The Circus 1870s-1950s, edited a year before by art gallery director Noel Daniel, who is the editor of Magic.
The two authors of the book, Mike Caveny and Jim Steinmeyer, are experts on the subject prestidigitators themselves. Caveney has published over fifty books on the theory, practice and history of magic, and practices stage-illusionism. Steinmeyer has even created tricks used by David Copperfield and Siegfried & Roy, as well as illusions used for Broadway shows. The aesthetic value of this collections hides among its pages, as if they were magic tickets that show how one illusionist influenced the next one over time. Strewn together by the texts of Caveney, Steinmeyer and Ricky Jay, this visual history of prestidigitation is a book full of surprises which, additionally, renders us children again by defying our expectations and violating the laws of reason. A beauty where there is one.
Related Articles
When ancient rituals became religion
The emergence of religions irreversibly changed the history of humanity. It’s therefore essential to ask when and how did ancient peoples’ rituals become organized systems of thought, each with their
Seven ancient maps of the Americas
A map is not the territory. —Alfred Korzybski Maps are never merely maps. They’re human projections, metaphors in which we find both the geographical and the imaginary. The cases of ghost islands
An artist crochets a perfect skeleton and internal organs
Shanell Papp is a skilled textile and crochet artist. She spent four long months crocheting a life-size skeleton in wool. She then filled it in with the organs of the human body in an act as patient
A musical tribute to maps
A sequence of sounds, rhythms, melodies and silences: music is a most primitive art, the most essential, and the most powerful of all languages. Its capacity is not limited to the (hardly trivial)
The enchantment of 17th-century optics
The sense of sight is perhaps one the imagination’s most prolific masters. That is why humankind has been fascinated and bewitched by optics and their possibilities for centuries. Like the heart, the
Would you found your own micro-nation? These eccentric examples show how easy it can be
Founding a country is, in some ways, a simple task. It is enough to manifest its existence and the motives for creating a new political entity. At least that is what has been demonstrated by the
Wondrous crossings: the galaxy caves of New Zealand
Often, the most extraordinary phenomena are “jealous of themselves” ––and they happen where the human eye cannot enjoy them. However, they can be discovered, and when we do find them we experience a
Think you have strange reading habits? Wait until you've seen how Mcluhan reads
We often forget or neglect to think about the infinite circumstances that are condensed in the acts that we consider habitual. Using a fork to eat, for example, or walking down the street and being
The sky is calling us, a love letter to the cosmos (video)
We once dreamt of open sails and Open seas We once dreamt of new frontiers and New lands Are we still a brave people? We must not forget that the very stars we see nowadays are the same stars and
The sister you always wanted (but made into a crystal chandelier)
Lucas Maassen always wanted to have a sister. And after 36 years he finally procured one, except, as strange as it may sound, in the shape of a chandelier. Maassen, a Dutch designer, asked the