Hello everyone!
Today’s topics are: CardWorkShop 2024; Basler Fasnacht playing cards clique
These are The Magic Memories 165, gone online Sunday, February 25th, 2024, at 0:07h sharp.
All The Magic Memories from 2021, 2022, and 2023, including the Magic Advent Calendar from 2020, can be found HERE.
CardWorkShop (CWS) 2024
I am just back from the 56th German CardWorkShop (CWS). As promised in The Magic Memories 164, here is a report about the event.
For those who came in late, I remind you that this is a yearly event of card aficionados that takes place in Germany. For more background information see The Magic Memories 113.
Location
During the years the location kept changing, but for the past decade it has been taking place in Stephan Kirschbaum’s Wundermanufaktur, the most recent from FEB 18th to 20th, 20024: Sunday evening, Monday full day, and Tuesday (late) morning, plus individual sessions at night with varying bedtimes…
Similar to the Spanish Escorial Card Conference, this is an invitation-only event which brings together some of the best cardmen of German-speaking Europe (Germany, Austria, and Switzerland).
Yes, “cardMEN”, as in the entire history of the CWS there has never been a woman who asked to be invited; she would certainly be welcome.
I should further mention that, similar to Escorial, everyone comes at his own expenses, pays his own hotel, and pays a flat fee for drinks, snacks, and meals (there is no “convention fee”, the costs are simply that: costs).
Depending from how far you arrive and whether you stay an extra day or not, this costs ca. $ 500 (it takes me over six hours from door-to-door to come from Basel to Nuremberg). So, this would sound quite remarkable for an outsider for doing card ticks during three days – for us, of course, it is something else…
The Subjects
The idea of the gathering is that subjects are decided upon at the end of the previous meeting, with those who want to participate in the relative presentations putting up their name in a list.
The group then works on the subject during the year and delivers a group-presentation in the following year. Well, that’s the idea, in theory, fact is that most start their work at the last moment…
In 2023 we decided on the following subjects to be presented in 2024:
1. The magic and publications of Frank Garcia (Markus Zadina, Tom Merten, Karl-Heinz Ritter, Magic Christian, Kurt Freitag, Roberto Giobbi)
2. Card tricks that require a set-up or lead into a set-up (Denis Behr, Pit Hartling)
3. Multiple Card Revelation (Helge Thun, Wolfgang Moser, Jörg Alexander)
4. Magic of Japan (Lorenz Schär, Tino Plaz, Marc Haufer)
The Schedule & Content
So that you get a general idea of how things work, here is an approximative schedule with a few of my comments.
When the CWS started out in 1975 it was composed almost exclusively of amateurs, i.e., people who had a “real” (!) job and card magic as a hobby, some at a high level, but still, a hobby.
Nowadays things have changed, as about 75% (!) of the participants are full-time professionals making their living exclusively from magic. An astonishing shift that has led to many changes in structure and content (again, see The Magic Memories 113 for more on the history).
In the past the CWS took place on FRI, SAT and SUN, work free week-ends for amateurs. Now it does on SUN, MON and TUE, as that is when professionals have less shows.
This year twenty-two attended.
Attendants start to come into the Wundermanufaktur on SUN late afternoon; there is greeting, small-talk and, of course, an apéro , i.e., drinks and delicious snacks, without which no worthy event in Europe is imaginable.
At 6 pm the first scheduled event starts, “The Personal Minutes”, where each one relates something outside of the main subjects. This can be a brief summary of what one has done in the past year, the presentation of some personal ideas, a book review, etc. This lasts about 90 minutes and is always a lovely ice breaker.
I gave an ultra-short presentation of one of Padre Ciuro’s booklets Juegos de manos y bolsillo, a first edition of which goes for several hundred Euros. Tamariz started out with these books, a whole series of them, and keeps recommending them – I agree.
I pointed out a presentational idea – how to steal someone’s memory – and an application I found with it. Those who follow this blog have seen it before, for newcomers, HERE IS the video clip.
After that we usually have a rich buffet, with lots of drinks and camaraderie, until about 10 pm, when the first big subject starts.
This year we began with “The magic and works of Frank Garcia” that lasted until well past 1 am, with presentations about the life of Garcia, anecdotes, comments on his books, the performance of some of the best tricks in the books, plus a large etc.
The man, his magic, and his publications could make for a substantial lecture.
Some of you will have seen my take on three tricks published in his legendary Super Subtle Card Miracles which I have discussed in Favorites, a video project I did with Vanishing Inc. several years ago. (You can get the DVD with two more “lectures” on it about Vernon and Elmsley, or get the download from the VI webshop).
Garcia was certainly a controversial figure because of the many uncredited entries in his books, although he did add several pages of credits at the end of Super Subtle Card Miracles about this book and Million Dollar Card Mysteries.
I, for my part, am thankful to Garcia, as especially the two aforementioned books where like a fresh breeze at the time they came out, with lots of truly magnificent material, techniques and tricks. The descriptions, though, I must say, are not very good, and certainly most beginners who bought the books at the time where at loss.
Well, these books typically show that magic is a profession, and that you need to learn the fundamentals of the art and its instruments. It is not the purpose of a magic book on great tricks to explain every technique and procedure from scratch. This is one of the reasons I wrote the Card College series.
Anyway, several of us who had met Garcia personally (Kurt, Christian and I) told various anecdotes, and we did lots of tricks from his books. These books are insofar a goldmine for the experienced card worker, as they require a lot of interpretation in the execution and presentation, the descriptions being so terse. They are a great exercise for creativity. And anyone, who learns the basics first, then studies the detailed work of the masters, plus reads material from “unfinished” books such as the one by Garcia, well, this person is on the way to become a fine magician.
(Nowadays beginners have the good chance to be able to supplement this written heritage with video material, but I am convinced that videos alone cannot replace written instructions and/or personal coaching.)
Back to the schedule: After this, it’s “open night”…
Monday morning talks start at 10 pm until 1 pm: “The card magic of Japan”.
Lorenz Schär, a professional from Berne, Switzerland, whom I have mentioned several times in these The Magic Memories, gave an excellent overview of the history of playing cards and card magic in Japan, before and after the opening.
This was supplemented with tricks, comments, etc. by Tino Plaz, another professional and very talented young man, and by Marc Haufer, who can certainly be called an inspired amateur with lots of performing experience and a very pleasing personality.
After a lunch break, the presentations continue, from 2:30 pm to dinner time, which is around 8:30 pm.
The main subject treated in this time slot was “Multiple Card Revelations”, presented by several. The subject is huge, of course, but we got a nice panoramic view of several of the problems that this interesting topic brings along.
Pit Hartling, a genius if there ever was one, performed a very original routine, where he had several cards selected, then, by tearing up a “wrong” card, managed to fold and hold the torn pieces in such a way, that they represented the chosen cards. I hope you have a chance to see this one day.
Denis Behr performed and walked us through one of his complex card concoctions which rely heavily on the fact that one trick sets up the order of the cards needed in the following trick. Denis, the creator and manager of the “Archives” and “Conjuring Credits”, is a remarkable man, and if you have a chance you should see him.
The topic, however, of setting up decks and delaying stacks, harbors more complexity than the presenters were able to disclose. There is certainly a lot of work that can be done here.
After dinner and the next morning, Tuesday, until almost 2 pm, there were more presentations, among others by Peter Grandt on the symbols hidden in playing cards, and Reinhard Müller on Mozart and his interest in card magic.
Break-out Sessions
A nice part of the gathering are those small moments of relax between the heavier talks and performances.
Below a take from the Coffee Shop right below the Wundermanufaktur, which does a great Cappuccino, here accompanied by a Portuguese pastel de nata. For me remarkable that Germany, who as recently as ten years ago had one of the worst coffees in Europe, now boasts many places that equal the best… as in Italy and Vienna, the two arguably, and of course only in my opinion, best in the world 🙂
And then it’s dinner time…
Varia
The CWS is also a great opportunity to meet some friends I see only once a year. Kurt Freitag from Vienna, one of my oldest friends in both senses of the term, had a wonderful photo he gave me that showed him and me in the company of Ascanio.
Although he could neither remember who the photographer was, nor where the photo was taken, my guess is that it was at the Austrian national convention in Graz that took place from June 5th to 8th, 1980, that is forty-four years ago!
The photo shows me in my youthful innocence performing some kind of Ace Trick to Ascanio. We had previously met at FISM 1979 in Brussels, my first World Convention, so he had already taken me under his wings 🙂
Basler Fasnacht 2024
As some of you might know, the carnival of Basel, along with that of Rio and Venice, is considered one of the three most important in the world.
The city of Basel that counts ca. 200’000 inhabitants grows to several millions during the three days of the carnival, quite amazing.
The Basler Fasnacht is by far the biggest event in the city that has also gained world-renown through the Art Basel and the Baselworld, the Watch and Jewelry Fair; not so bad for a city the size of Fayetteville in North Carolina 🙂
This is not the place to report about this quite beautiful and complex event; If you are interested, you can see some representative photos, film clips and read some info (in six languages, including English!) by CLICKING HERE.
Let me just mention that over 300 “groups” called cliques celebrate the Fasnacht with music, songs, texts and colorful costumes, plus huge lanterns, wagons, etc.
Below you see a clique that has playing cards as a subject… what else!
Wish you all a successful and happy week,
Roberto Giobbi
I met Garcia at one of the Abbott’s Close-Up Conventions in Colon, Michigan, USA, in the late ’80s or early ’90s. He did a fabulous trick with two toy cars (like the British “Matchbox” cars). He put a dark blue one in one hand and a white one in the other. He spread his hands. A little woo-woo and they had changed places! I was astonished! The next week I was in the local magic shop and told the owner about this impossible piece of magic. He calmly and patiently explained to me that these cars–with heat-sensitive paint–are available at every toy store.
Well, sure–but if you never go to toy stores…
At about that time my wife and I were corresponding with Jan Longone, Curator of American Culinary History at Special Collections, Hatcher Library, University of Michigan. I bought her a copy of Million Dollar Card Secrets, on the grounds that it contains a recipe–for Arroz con Pollo. (And, as you’re probably aware, Garcia makes a whimsical reference to Marlo disputing the use of a slotted spoon, while Slydini assures him it’s a better choice.)
That was a great summary of the Frank Garcia symposium! He was one of my magic heroes. I would love to see a study on his friend Father Cyprian, the cappuchin monk. We got the word “cappuccino” from the brown colored robes the cappuchin mom’s wear.