Magic Convention – How magicians improve their skills

The question I am asked the most, apart from how did you do that, is how did you learn your craft and how do you improve your skill.

Like with any other business, there are conventions. There you can attend lectures held by famous or not so famous magicians, there are shows and usually exhibits that shows the latest and the greatest trick.

Personally, I don’t go very often because of the focus on tricks and sales. I believe improvement comes from doing as many performances as you can and analyzing what went well and sometimes what went wrong.

Every now and then there is a magic convention that goes off the beaten track. Earlier this year I signed up for a convention/lectures in Madrid Spain. What drew me to it was the fact that it was limited to 15 participants. It is called Campus Magico.

They had 6 teachers and the focus was on the way magic is approached in Spain. There were lectures about the history of Spanish Magic, lessons in active theatre and mime, storytelling and others.  Each lecturer did a full day seminar with various exercises.

The location was about 30 km outside Madrid in a beautiful farmhouse. There was nothing around to distract your attention, so full focus on the lectures and exercises was guaranteed.

What I liked best is that I didn’t learn a single effect but improved on the ones I do already. Furthermore it was great to meet other performers from the UK, Germany, Spain, Canada and the US. I hope to be back next year