Postby Fred Zimmerman » December 15th, 2005, 1:51 pm
To Patrick Differ:
You're welcome. I can totally understand your grappling with "meaning" in magic, and I agree that's what's meaningful to you will not necessarily be meaningful to another. However, this feeling lies at the threshhold of Artistic expression.
When you express an inner thought, either visually, physically, or through the written word, within that expression lies what you find meaningful. And when you do this, you are laying yourself on the line. You are exposing a part of yourself - leaving your ideas open to judgement, ridicule, or acceptance. This is art. Again, the viewer can like it, be indifferent to it, or find it repugnant, but at least it contains something that is intrinsically YOU.
Now, in the commercial world, this kind of "personal expression and meaning" exists on a razor's edge. I want to be meaningful, certainly, but then again, I want to make a living. The two do not necessarily go hand in hand. I have been in coutless new productions where the author wants to communicate one thing, the director has different feelings, the actors are rudderless, and the producer just wants it to make money. Or, nobody in the process has a clear idea of what they want to say, and the results are justifiably predictable.
Yick.
Sometimes, the union of all these elements results in a wonderful piece of work.
Other times, they are a living and breathing nightmare - a week in, week out reminder of how ignorant people can be.
But most of the time, it's a balance. Working in the trenches of restaurants or cocktail parties, you generally have to keep the "meaning" to a minimum. This is not only expedient, but it's generally the only way to go if you actually want to get return clients.
However, even though the "meaning" may be at a minimum, you always have to dial up the "relevance." When you're competing with countless distractions, you have to cut through it all. The power of personality can get you 99% of the way there, and then actually doing something that connects to the audience and is interesting and relevant - bang, you're there.
Now, I agree, when you want to do something that has a little more depth, you have to have more control over the venue. And by depth, I don't necessarily mean dramatic and heart wrenching. What I mean by depth is communicating a personal point-of-view, a unique outlook on life translated into artistic expression. Funny, sad, quirky, whatever.
One of the movements in magic has been to mount magic within a theatrical presentation. This, I see, as very healthy. It allows many magicians who have chosen to work their whole careers under more restrictive circumstances to experience a vehicle where they have some control and can communicate some of their own personal thoughts and ideas.
Is this is ONLY way magic should be presented? Absolutely not, and to categorize these productions as "meaningful crap" is to stifle the growth of the art of magic. Do Broadway Producers look down their nose at street theatre? No way, because it's this kind of gritty, take-chances, no-holds-barred kind of performance that energizes the entire scene, and eventually results in shifting a paradigm.
I was born, grew up, and currently live in Chicago, and we're very proud of our theatrical heritage and how the off-Loop scene has made an enormous impact on the Amercian theatre.
We are equally proud of our magical heritage. Close-up magic made enormous strides and grew exponentially in the magical hothouse that was Chicago in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Bizarre Magic has firm roots here, and certainly the effect of that movement on magic-at-large has been enormous (and may lie at the root of much of this "meaning in magic" contraversey).
Certainly, Chicago was not the only place where magic grew and evolved. However, had dissenting voices kept this from happening, we would all be the poorer.
The point is, when it rains, everyone gets wet. When a magical idea breaks new ground or develops an existing idea, everyone benefits, and woe be us all if we hold these new ideas in contempt.
Just remember, an idea is a very dangerous thing ... when it's the only one you have.
Fred Zimmerman