Aesthetic Magic
By Oscar S. Teale
"Tired at first sight with what the muse imparts,
In fearless youth we attempt the height of Art."
"What magic shall solve us the secret
Of beauty that's born for an hour."
"Aesthetics" is the Science or Theory of the Beautiful; therefore, there is but one deduction to be made from the caption to this Argument.
Aesthetic Magic must of necessity be beautiful magic, it cannot be otherwise, if so, it falls short of the necessary qualifications, therefore is not aesthetic, but at once becomes commonplace, ordinary.
The purpose and intent of this sketch is to sow the seed of aesthetics, to water those seeds, and to nourish them into mature, fruitbearing trees, or to leave at least one healthy plant for cultivation, that in due time, the buds of beauty may burst forth into full bloom of a pure, undefiled stage of refined Art in Magic. Magic should be the most beautiful of stage performances. The spectacular stage is dependent on the principles of magic for its greatest charm; illusionary effects. If the stage of Magic should be endowed with the same energy which impels the scenic artist of spectacular productions, it would prove a revelation to the pleasure-seeker, and the extremely vulgar comedy of the exposer would be hurled to perdition for shelter and protection. The only suitable place in which it might seek refuge that it might hide its face for shame.
Application of Higher Principles
Art in Magic is like art in any other-pursuit, occupation or accomplishment. It is simply the application of higher principles. The development of refinement and its application. The greater the refinement and the more direct the application, the higher the art, and the highest degree of art is that which approximates the greatest degree of perfection. None can expect to attain a height too exalted to be above criticism. There is no such thing as perfection in art. Nature alone can be accredited with any form or thing in perfection. Perfection is of Divine creation. The creations of man are of a lower order, they may possess a high degree of merit, but are not perfect, neither can they consistently be classified with perfection.
The possibilities of aesthetic magic in the hands of high class artists are boundless. Aesthetic magic is not the mere "doing of tricks," neither is it the "doing of tricks" at all, but rather the presentation of Problems in a masterly manner. Just as the conscientious dramatist in "legitimate drama" renders his part, as true to the real character being portrayed as his best efforts will aid him in doing. The greatest success crowns his efforts just as soon as he becomes qualified to eliminate his own personality and permits it to become absorbed by the personality of the character assumed. Just so, a Magician will enter the realm of aesthetic magic, just as soon as he casts off his own personality (forgets that he is before the audience in person) and actually plays the part of a miracle worker, with full assurance and confidence in his own power and ability for so doing. When he impresses upon the minds of his audience that the effect which he simulates is not a mere effect, but an actual occurrence; that the thing has actually been done, and not counterfeited. With him there should be no apparent consciousness of a counterfeit existing. A climax should be a natural and infallible sequence to his superior commands; since he has so willed it, it could not be otherwise. This is Aesthetic Magic, Beautiful Magic. An aesthetic stage, or stage setting is not an essential to aesthetic magic. Beautiful accessories and beautiful setting will prove invaluable aids, though not at all a necessity.
Dr. Wiljalba Frickel's Program
The conduct of an artist may be beautiful on a bare stage, and if he has the power to transform that stage into a thing of beauty by the marvelous power of his wand, so much the better. Dr. Wiljalba Frikell gave an aesthetic program without the aid of fine accessories. His work was done mainly on the open, stage shorn of the numerous tables and paraphernalia other than that immediately in hand for the presentation of the problem being treated. (Space on hand forbids giving my impressions of his two-hour performance which I witnessed at Steinway Hall, New York City, two score or more years ago.) He was the first magician to do away with cumbersome apparatus, long draped tables which concealed a confederate and discarded the regulation costume as used by his contemporaries, and donned a correct evening dress. The first requisite for Aesthetic Magic, is the man, he must be an artist, a gentleman of refinement, a cultured man has advantage over the uncultured man, though scholastic culture is not a prerequsite. I have known men on the theatrical stage who were ignorant, quite ignorant, in the sense of ordinary education, nevertheless they were a success in the role they assumed.
Blind Tom's Natural Aptitude
There is such a thing as natural aptitude, a man may be endowed by nature with a talent for imitation and mimicry. Blind Tom the phenominal protege pianist was one such. Born in slavery in the South, endowed by nature with supernormal perception and a marvelously impressionable mind and retentive memory, a memory susceptible to indelible impressions apparently without effort or seeming consciousness. Impressions were made on his mind just as the matrix produces plates from which reproductions can be printed by mechanical process. He was merely an imitating machine, a human automat to all intents and purposes. He was not a thinking machine, for while the original performance was in progress by an artist whom he was expected to imitate, his antics would seem conducive to distraction rather than attention. He would hop about the stage on one foot, with head projected forward and both arms and hands extending in front at right angles to his body (actually waltzing on one foot) apparently absolutely oblivious to the fact that any musical number was being rendered for his benefit or otherwise, nevertheless, the performer had no sooner ceased his rendition of complexed original composition than the protege was lead to the piano stool on which he would plant himself and immediately proceed to execute an exact reproduction of the original with all the technique of expression and minute shading, and he would do all this in a masterly, aesthetic manner. He was a born artist, a musical phenomenon. And yet so ignorant, even of music, that if told that C. sharp on the piano is "New York," he would remember that particular bit of ebony as being "New York"; at least, such was his state of mind as vouched for by his manager when introducing him to an audience.
A Manipulator should be an Actor
A manipulator of cards, coins, billiard balls, thimbles, etc., may do his manipulation in an aesthetic manner, at any time and anywhere; provided he maintains the dignity and beauty of clean work, and successfully conceals the subterfuges employed. If he convinces his auditors that he has actually performed a marvelous act and not beguiled them, or entertained them by mere juggling skill (juggling skill is legitimate and is more often aesthetically presented than magic)—the writer once witnessed the disappearance of cards by the "back hand palm" (?) and after producing an aesthetic effect, the artist (?) deliberately turned his hand over to show the audience that he had dexterously concealed the cards by passing them behind his fingers. And that man publicly boasts or claims that "Magicians are born, not made"—if so—in his case (to borrow an expression from my friend, the late Marshall P. Wilder) "Nature made a bad job of it." Far better for him and for the magic stage, if nature had been augmented by aesthetic culture, and had taught him that "a thing of beauty is a joy forever"; that to create a thing of beauty, then, deliberately despoil it is a sacrilege to art, an unwarranted exhibition of gross ignorance as a performer of magic and an artist. An acknowledgment of unmitigated EGO. Arrogance is always the offspring of ignorance. Ignorance and lack of aesthetic culture prompts an arrogant entertainer to bestow honors upon himself and to magnify his own importance by conferring upon himself the degree, "The Great" (so and so). Time enough to adopt that designation after it has been decreed by the public the press and others; then and not until then, can one make use of the title without exposing himself to a charge of arrogance, and self-aggrandizement. He certainly seems to take Shakespeare too literally and appears ignorant of the fact that Mr. Shakespeare had no acquaintance with him personally (it is more than possible he has no knowledge that Shakespeare ever lived)—when he wrote: "Go to, let us be a celebrated individual."
It is sheer ignorance which prompts the misjudging of ardent zeal on the part of a conscientious performer when he puts his very soul in his work and makes sacrifice of his personal interests that the best results might be attained. I have known cases where a magician's conscientious work has been mistaken for arrogance, and his zeal for egoism.
To produce aesthetic magic, the artist must be perfectly at ease, he must be thoroughly familiar with the subject in hand, and secure in a consciousness of his own ability to perform. There are necessary qualifications and essentials to graceful stage deportment, and graceful stage deportment is the chief element in Aesthetic Magic, beautiful magic.
In this Argument as in all Arguments, it is simply impossible to treat one subject without effervescing, and by that effervescence, amalgamate in a measure, with all other Arguments. The various phases of art in magic, cannot be segregated, one from another. The various subjects must be considered and treated correlatively. ART is ART, and there is no substitute for it. Aesthetic Magic is Beautiful Magic, and there is no alternative.
Originally published in the M-U-M in Vol. 7, No. 59, in New York, February 1918.
