Sybil Disobedience Where creativity flourishes. A blog by Kevin Ho.

Congratulations, James from Joker and the Thief: you’ve just won an Aladdin deck, a Chinatown deck, and a free copy of Pop Fly by Bizau Cristian!

I’ve been receiving a huge influx of great comments ever since I started with the new blogging format this month, and in fact it was hard to just choose one winner amongst so many great contributors.

That being said, if you read James’ comment from the Magic? No. Magical? Hell Yes. post below, it’s pretty clear why I chose it:

Nice post, Kev.

I think the way flourishing is used is important. My first point would have to be directly related to magic. I recently heard Zach Mueller speak about how he is not JUST a Cardist and not JUST a magician. He explained that he created more magic effects after practicing Cardistry than he had beforehand. The reason being is that flourishing provides many different techniques when it comes to manueveing playing cards. This influenced Zach’s magic because it opened the doors for new opportunities when creating. He took magic and infused Cardistry with it to influence his magic.

Cardistry has an air of artistic creativity and impossibility that really makes the art form eye candy. On top of that, not many people do it. I, personally, used to perform magic (I still do a bit here and there) however when I saw some basic flourishes in the Royal Road I fell in love with them. I know people love to watch magic and it is VERY fun to perform but I always had felt that flourishing was more visual and my skill could really be shown off, recognised and appreciated. Magic has the ‘wow’ factor but the audience doesn’t know just how much practice, devotion and practice is put into it. I’m now delving into a deeper subject and I prefer to leave this can if worms closed.

I think flourishing can have many uses where magic cannot. Quickly displaying what you do to people in impromptu situations is just one of many. Another example is that we are doing live Cardistry on stage at a musical. The thing is, magic would not suit for that particular situation, so we are doing cardistry which will be projected via a live feed on screens. To the viewers even though it is NOT magic it is still considered magical, as mentioned in the blog. The audience RECOGNISES what you are doing is in fact NOT magic at all, however it appears to be magical in their eyes due to the fact that something completely new, unheard of and seemingly impossible movements are being created right in front of them.

So is there a link between Magic and Cardistry? There very well could be… “Magic? No. Magical? Hell yes.” Just my substantially large two cents worth.

- James

Joker and the Thief

Combining well thought-out insights and observations, relevant anecdotes that provided clear examples for he was talking about, as well as the ability to tie everything together at the end, this is the best comment I’ve received all month.

It definitely sets the bar high for the winner of next month’s comments giveaway contest, the details of which will be announced next week.

And James, if you’re reading this, be sure to check your e-mail inbox: you’ve got a message waiting for you :)

Hey guys! If you’ve noticed the lack of posts over the past few days, it’s because I’ve been busy preparing for tonight’s session with The Virts in Kuching, Malaysia:

Our flight leaves in less than three hours, so I’m literally getting dressed and eating breakfast as I’m writing this. Still, I wanted to let you guys know that while this blog has been inactive for a couple days and will continue to be for a couple more, posting will resume on Tuesday, the 26th of March.

We’ll be taking plenty of photos of the session, so those will be posted on here as soon as we get back.

Till then, remember that you can still win two decks and a free copy of Pop Fly by leaving a comment anywhere on this site, and don’t forget to like the new Sybil Disobedience Facebook page as well :)

See you guys in a few days’ time — I’m off to the airport!

As part of this month’s comments giveaway initiative, I wanted the winner to have something new to practice with the two decks he’s receiving. So with last week’s magical flourishing topic in mind, I enlisted the help of my friend and fellow magician/flourisher Bizau Cristian, who has offered to send a free digital copy of his download Pop Fly to the reader with the best comment.

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