Strategies of Magic
2011-2014

Strategies of Magic is an ongoing series of performances using the concept of magic to address the nature of political work and revolves around the relationship between illusionism and magic. The work includes spoken text, music and magic shows, all of which elements aim to reveal rather than disguise the trick behind the manifestation. 

In Strategies of Magic, the concept of magic is used a metaphor for political transformation and a tool for manifesting resistance. By rejecting a rational and normative way of understanding the world, magic –much like art– allows for an associative linking of seemingly unrelated phenomena, united by attributes that are intangible and imperceptible rather than evident. As such, magic holds the potential to reveal new possibilities, create new identities and discourses and undermine the confrontational deadlock between power and resistance. 

The project is a continuously developing one which was first performed in 2011 and which has been presented in eight different editions to date. In this piece Lundgren frequently invites other artists to collaborate with her in one capacity or another; all of whom contribute to the further development of the piece.