Magic Thesis Will Work

In my thesis project I want to research what magic is, how it functions, what it means as a concept, and what it can mean for a person. I want to explore the relation between functional magic and the reconstruction of non-hierarchical perception and subjectivity, by playing the card of the potency that lies in between the normative or suppressive, the absurd and the ridiculous. This will be done by the exploration of Animism and Mimesis in the filosophy of Benjamin and Guattari, as well as by a guided journey trough some contemporary artist’s practices. Here, I will sample and analyze the practice of magicians, such as William S Burroughs, Genisis P. Orridge and Antonin Artaud and trace how functional magic (or spellcasting) worked for them. From the practice of magic I will flow into the practice of healing, this, trough the works of Lygia Clark, AA Bronson and Alejandro Jodorowsky. I will try to arrive at a definition of blessing, healing and functional magic, and will try to describe how they can be put into practice. In the general sense I will research how magic, healing and blessing functions within the arts, following the spiritual and creative journey of these artists as reference points to that of my own. Put differently I am playing with the question of transcendence, magic and the operation of energy in the contemporary world, and within the arts.

-relation to previous practice-

In my active practice I tend to generate a space in which I can open up my sensatory array. This is done mostly by construction sites/spaces that offer themselves to function as a temple, healing-salon or dwelling, in which I can emit or pass on energy. In whatever case, these spaces are simultaneously architecturally formed, as mentally sculpted. To approach this energy, and the potentiality of that energy, I anchor myself in traditional methodologies for energy working as well as new instantaneous, intuitively-automated, or guided methodologies, that revolve around blockades, limits of the body and of situation and of faith. This energy is mostly already present, but is at many times not deliberately activated or being related to. Here, the exchange or activation of energy between two things seems to bring both of these things back to an original or whole state and reaffirms both entities of its present existence, under the attention of one-another. This attentative affirmation towards a being’s, object’s or a bodies singular cells charge the energy that is present within and around them positively. Perhaps, it is simply re-charged without the addition positive or negative. This re-charging can be perceived as Healing.

An example of this is Sjassa B. Lovejoy’s Practice in which I transformed a gallery-space into a healing-salon, by placing a massage table, room divider, waiting bench, rug and towel cabinet in the space. I also stocked up some essential oils and sacred liquids from Santeria shops in Rotterdam, as well as assembling utensils and objects that are initiated by their frequent use in sessions and shows. (both publicly and privately) In this showroom the light was altered to an overall red light which changed the perceptibility of space and time-of-day. Layer upon layer of burning sage smoke was distributed across the space, as well as cologne and liquids that were vaporized. In one-on-one sessions, visitors received a healing treatment from SunAndTheMoon and me.

Next to the facet of my practice in which I research the functioning of healing, I work in formation with other artists to offer services and products to the market that are not yet in the market, or have been eradicated from the common-day market by failing to be efficient, clinical and reliable enough in a system of large scale production, cheap profits and the promise of fulfilling illusionary (or at least, temporal) desires.

What is most evident here, is the production and stimulation of paradox, the anti-promise or the leap-of-faith. By supplying, so to speak, a marsh of potential value and meaning, an inherent skill within man is being re-activated, namely that of finding one’s way. By creating visual assemblages of material sourced from grocery stores, commodity shops and markets, as well as junkyards, forests en swamps, in combination with sacred/profane objects from out a personal source, I attempt to diffuse the analytical reading of a situation. Herewith avoiding descriptive language as a reductive mechanism that produces abstract and detached understanding, offering the de-centralization of subjectivity, logic and knowledge. Important here is the fundamental difference between understanding and undergoing , the latter here signifies the activated and individualized participation in the creation of one’s understanding, or reading, and thus – creation – of reality.

-relation to larger context-

In the broader context of politics, society and identity, one might wonder what exactly the public function of a shaman or healer is, should be, of could be. The question of what it means that someone is allowed to function as a healer can be extended into the question of what it means that everyone could function as a healer. Alongside here of course, is the question of the power - power, as we might be aware of, can only be given to a transient wielder, and can in fact also be transmitted into oneself.

Within the domains of working as a healer, or within affiliation with the identity of a healer, a politics of identity originates. Being as it appears to be, that a shaman has a tribe or peer-group, for him to function publically, it also appears that s/he must have a geographical, or demographical domain to operate in. Which makes it a problematic identity when it comes to collaboration, within the world of the arts, as well as within the world of healing. Seeing, as we are, that there is a necessity in the breaking of hierarchical structure as a blueprint of society, there must also be an option for healing to be de-centralized. Which leads me to the following dilemma’s: how can a methodology for healing or magic be transferable and commonly operational, without a single methodology becoming the holy written one, as it were. Perhaps, here, an answers lies within transfer of knowledge trough the sensuous rather that trough that of the written word. For might not a star appears in the sky, carrying as it were, the answers to a union’s scars and troubles. A star, that as far as I am aware, must have a human origin, and must therefore, to at least some degree, posses desires and needs of him/herself. Although this moment might appear to be describing to a large degree the reliability-problem of a methodology offered by a healer, it is also alluding to a more traditional answer: the concept of the wounded-healer. Within the concept of the wounded-healer, the central protagonist is in fact injured him/her self, be it physical or energetical, and discovers in process the ability s/he has to cure, or resolve his/her ailment. Here, a methodology offered stems from the ability of self-healing, or as elsewhere described, that of ‘direct revelation’, and evolves into an approach to healing that is adapted for the use on one’s else. But, within the often subjective nature of ailments, being composed of a multiplicity of physical, mental, spiritual and/or energetical sources, we might conclude a cure must therefore also be of the same subjective nature. Thus, a healers methodology for healing, ambiguous of sort. Perhaps, this is due to the ambiguity of desire itself. Because, after all, who are we to know what we want? How could we ever be accountable for a methodology that is transient, often local and of slumbering progression? And which is on top of all this often described as advent from the skies, or brought to us from some invisible spirit, which we, fair enough, evoked or called upon.

To a large degree, as with many problems, I believe the resolution must be explored case-by-case, and can henceforth only be resolved locally, and never as a totality of debatabilities. This, as I see it, is a vain and ambitious tour from which I attempt to resign. Though, still, there have been successful cases, in which a written down methodology for healing had been made available for successors. True, as far as I am aware, not indented for dogmatic and politicized use. Here, I am referring to the letters of Lygia Clark that pose insight into ‘imaginary inwardness of the body’ as a place where one finds significance. The transferability of methodology, as well as the provision of insight into the inner-space of one’s being, as I a doing here profoundly, obviously lay within my desires, though should be, as read, handled with attentiveness and awareness.

But, perhaps, to evade the above stated problem of the ambiguous healer, as both a bearer of cosmic utensils, yet prompted into being trough the meeting of successful sperm and egg, one might look for alternative approaches to healing. Described here, is the entry into an artistic research which has been phrased ‘..how to remove the star from the movie..’, and bears the prelude of unmanned-installations or devises, offering, as it were, a sensuous reality – or healing – without my (direct) touch. Though this might in a sense be a description of artworks in general, it is, in reference to my artistic repertoire, a new division. And it might in turn for healing, supply the same.

-practical steps-

Now to come to a plane of practicalities. As for the most of the explorations, I will be continuing my reading on Lygia Clark, Alejandro Jodorowsky, William S. Burroughs’ Cut-up-technique as explored by Genesis P-Orridge, and the possibility of healing/magic trough artworks as explored by Antonin Artaud. In close proximity of these research strands I will be involved into obtaining more first-hand experience of the content at hand, either trough my individual practice, as well as by establishing contact with other practitioners, be it trough writing, be it trough shared endeavors. These, will in turn, find their way back into the thesis by either explicit, or non-explicit reference.

I will attempt to relate the discoveries of myself and these other practitioners to a more philosophical background that is being explored by Angela Melitopoulos in her work Asseblages on, amongst others, Felix Guattari, and the seminar offered by Jan Verwoert on mimesis and animism, structured around Walter Benjamin and associated writers and thinkers. The extend of this philosophical background relies on my capacity to voice, as it were, these sources.

As for the dual nature of the Graduation thesis, I can only state that, where my writing aims to suspend disbelief, my physical practice will allude to a leap of faith. It is most likely to contain an architectural component that offers shelter to the dweller and his activities within, as well as supply a profound resilience and a, hopefully, alluring presence from without.

-five Sources-

1. The spiritual journey of Alejandro Jodorowsky. 2. The research and practice of Genesis P-Orridge in relation to Burroughs’ Cut-Up Technique, and therewith the magical practice of both of them. 3. The artistic and healing ‘careers’ of Lygia Clark and AA Bronson. 4. The magical application of drawings (or at large; artworks) by Antonin Artaud. 5. The recent research on Animism and Mimesis done by Angela Melitopoulos, and Jan Verwoert.