amuse-bouche.001
Amuse-Bouche is a collection of random bits of amusing things and thoughts. They may or may not be directly or loosely related to magic. These posts will be updated for a month and pinned to the top until the next month.
7/25 - real matching cubes
It would be interesting to have a spectator try to solve the cube behind their backs- which would genuinely mix up a cube, they stop but keep the cube behind them when they think they’ve solved it, then you also try to solve it but give up. Spectator’s cube is brought out to reveal it’s not solve. But then the true reveal is that they both match. Both cubes examinable. Method involves a peek via an app or something and you’d have to be a beast like this guy:
7/21 - wwyd?
What would you do with real magic powers? It would be cool to have a trick that serves a positive outcome. Like you invite friends to help clean up the local park, and at the end, they each select a few pieces of trash and combine them to make a piece of artwork under the guise of ‘content for the gram’. At the end, you go “huh, so this is actually the second time I’ve done this…” and show them a post that you made the previous week with a suspiciously similar artwork at another part with a different group of friends. Don’t have a method, but fun to think about.
7/19 - abstract art
Some time ago I was chatting with Danny Garcia about abstract art. I don’t really get it but think it’s fine, I guess. He mentioned this idea that the process of creating something abstract could be make it more interesting. His example was one of those pieces with just a single dot or line in the middle of the page that were being sold for millions, and what if the artists had gone through some process of extracting and processing their own blood to get that specific color and texture and putting a dot of that on a blank canvas. I suppose that could be pretty cool. Anyways, I was listening to this podcast No Such Thing As A Fish that’s about interesting facts, and one of the facts they shared was this lady in 1826 discovered fossilized ink in some prehistoric squid and her friend extracted and used that ink to illustrate fossils. It’s not art, but it reminded me of that conversation. Also, this happened in 1826! Nuts. Here’s the article if you wanna read.
7/17 - tennis mentalism
“You can’t problem solve unless you have the ability or the empathy to perceive all that’s around you. The more you understand what the problem is through other people’s lens, the more you can solve for people in life…” - Andre Agassi.
It’s definitely something magic lacks- empathy. Most magic theories, as insightful as they are, are guesswork and assumptions based our point of view and “verified” by the reactions and number of years performed. We rarely take time to actually see how we can more effectively understand spectators on a personal level- through their lens. The best we’ve got is “tell an emotional story and relate that to an important person or object they’re thinking of”. Anyways, hope tennis mentalism becomes more of a thing.
7/14 - costume change context
I don’t do any stage stuff but this is great context for a costume change. It actually makes the moment feel magical and genuinely surprising. We get a great reaction from the crowd to help play it up at the beginning too. Then when the change happens even the commentators are surprised. Seems like the act can be done without the change too. So if they picked the right event to do this- especially if others have seen the act without the change, that’ll make it even more magical. The only bummer is that everyone catches on when the nature of the dance movements and wardrobe design flashes the method. But still, I think that moment is pretty magical.