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Conjuring the Spirit World: Art, Magic, and Mediums
Explore the essential role art and objects played for mediums and magicians “communicating” with the dead during the 19th- and 20th-century Spiritualism movement in the U.S. and Europe — a time when people actively debated and wondered, "can spirits return?" See paintings, posters, photographs, stage apparatuses, costumes, film, publications and other objects that will transport visitors to the age of Harry Houdini, Margery the Medium, Howard Thurston, and the Fox Sisters, among others. Whether you’re a believer, skeptic or somewhere in between, gain a new perspective on the timeless draw of mediums and magicians, séances and magic shows.
This book is published on the occasion of the exhibition Conjuring the Spirit World: Art, Magic, and Mediums, organized by the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts.
This book is published on the occasion of the exhibition Conjuring the Spirit World: Art, Magic, and Mediums, organized by the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts.
144 pages, Hardcover
Published September 3, 2024
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 5, 2025
The biggest problem with this book is that there's only so much you can say about the early days of Spiritualism and magic. Because of this the essays in this book constantly repeat the same information over and over. It's a fascinating subject and I liked the art but after reading the same stuff on repeat grew tiresome.
August 2, 2025
This book is like attending a lecture at a curated historical collection about Spiritualism throughout the late 1800’s/early 1900’s. It’s well researched in that it sticks to the topic and the specific story it’s telling, but it also includes some fun and interesting historical stories - particularly about the rivalry on whether or not Spiritualism is real or believable between Houdini and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle which was a captivating bit of drama.
The book takes the reader through the early days of Spiritualism (a spiritual movement from the 19th century in the US and Europe based on the belief that departed souls can interact with the living), and describes what practices became popular from the 1800’s until now (Ouji boards and psychics being the primary outlets surviving into our modern day), discussing much of it as contrived or an illusion, while still being gentle enough to recognize that many people have always been drawn to believing (and let’s face it, there are many unknowns even if that isn’t what’s highlighted in this book).
For me, it was a fun read about historical seekers as I fit into this category of seeker (or whatever you want to call it) also so it’s always cool to read about how this seems to be somewhat of an innate human trait for some throughout history. I wish the book was a little more open to curiosity and the unknown, but that’s not really the point of the book. It serves as more of a historical reference, and being written by historians and professors, it’s mostly the facts. However, while magicians always admitted they were masters of deception and illusion and this book uncovers a lot of these tricks, there were plenty of “spiritualists”, mediums and even sometimes scientists who had more of a belief in the unknown throughout time. Personally, I own a gothic Victorian house built in 1849 in upstate NY and I always love to imagine there were some cool Victorians holding seances there back in the day.
Beyond the historical stories of Houdini (who always desired to believe, yet spent his life debunking fraudulent mediums) and Sir Conan Doyle who was one of the most famous supporters of belief in Spiritualism and often defended the practices, there was also a brief chapter about Ethel le Rossignol who is such a fascinating artist and I’d love to learn more about her. I wished that more of the art that sprung from this movement was highlighted, and that the book had a broader focus, but I don’t regret reading it, it’s a fun one to flip through and overall an interesting historical book, which also features plenty of illustrations - mostly vintage advertisements, and photographs of artifacts from the Spiritualism’s history.
The book takes the reader through the early days of Spiritualism (a spiritual movement from the 19th century in the US and Europe based on the belief that departed souls can interact with the living), and describes what practices became popular from the 1800’s until now (Ouji boards and psychics being the primary outlets surviving into our modern day), discussing much of it as contrived or an illusion, while still being gentle enough to recognize that many people have always been drawn to believing (and let’s face it, there are many unknowns even if that isn’t what’s highlighted in this book).
For me, it was a fun read about historical seekers as I fit into this category of seeker (or whatever you want to call it) also so it’s always cool to read about how this seems to be somewhat of an innate human trait for some throughout history. I wish the book was a little more open to curiosity and the unknown, but that’s not really the point of the book. It serves as more of a historical reference, and being written by historians and professors, it’s mostly the facts. However, while magicians always admitted they were masters of deception and illusion and this book uncovers a lot of these tricks, there were plenty of “spiritualists”, mediums and even sometimes scientists who had more of a belief in the unknown throughout time. Personally, I own a gothic Victorian house built in 1849 in upstate NY and I always love to imagine there were some cool Victorians holding seances there back in the day.
Beyond the historical stories of Houdini (who always desired to believe, yet spent his life debunking fraudulent mediums) and Sir Conan Doyle who was one of the most famous supporters of belief in Spiritualism and often defended the practices, there was also a brief chapter about Ethel le Rossignol who is such a fascinating artist and I’d love to learn more about her. I wished that more of the art that sprung from this movement was highlighted, and that the book had a broader focus, but I don’t regret reading it, it’s a fun one to flip through and overall an interesting historical book, which also features plenty of illustrations - mostly vintage advertisements, and photographs of artifacts from the Spiritualism’s history.
November 10, 2024
This book is informative and fun, but mostly, it is gorgeous. The images and lay out are extraordinary - a perfect coffee table book, especially for spooky season.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews