Magic Show

"Magic Show" demonstrates how visual artists and magicians both operate in realms where logic becomes unstable, and superstition, fantasy and mysticism encroach. It shows how artists adopt magicians' perception-shifting ploys and manipulate or redirect credulity in their explorations of the creative agency of illusion, the power of suggestion and the fragility of belief. This fully illustrated book contains essays by co-curators Jonathan Allen and Sally O'Reilly and illustrated texts on each of the 24 artists. It also features newly commissioned essays by Simon During, Brigitte Felderer, Peter Lamont, Pierre Taillefer, Helen Varola and Marina Warner; a compendium of existing texts on the theme of magic from Theodor Adorno to H.G. Wells; and, a selection of magical ephemera.