Today I find myself writing about the things of magic.

In Conjuring Asia, Goto-Jones says – ‘magic is not an object, not a prop or a mechanism, not even a technique or an accomplishment. As least, not per se . Magic flows from the hands of a magician only when an audience feels magic happening. It is an interpersonal and intersubjective phenomenon. And that, more than anything else, is the secret to magic: a magician is one who causes you to feel that magic has transpired , no matter what has transpired.’

True, I think, however I find myself increasingly interested not in what a magician causes the audience to feel, but rather how the magician themselves feels about the objects they use. The performative and personal memorates they form in the practice of their art. Not only the function of the object in rehearsal and performance, but also the value of provenance and history, the meaning, the making, and the mechanisms of the object.

I wrote about a personal memorate in a blog a couple of years ago. I’m very keen to explore the memorates of other magicians, in whatever form they be.