Page 1 of 1

Art/Music and Magic

Posted: Wed Jul 15, 2020 12:25 pm
by Jadziya
"She should have paid more attention to the thing about music. Power found its way out by all sorts of routes... Music and magic had a lot in common. They were only two letters apart, for one thing. And you couldn't do both."

Ok, so this is a quote from the Discworld series (not a grimoire). However, for those of you familiar with Josephine McCarthy's work, she holds that creativity/art and magic draw from the same "energy source", and it is a limited energy source. Therefore, it is rare to find a world class artist who is also a skilled and regularly practising magician. (I think I am expressing her views correctly; I am paraphrasing)

I can see that the similarity between the arts and magic. Also, a lot of performance artists use magic (either to improve their art, improve their popularity/income, or to express esoteric ideas). I can also see phases in my life where a magical impulse was chanelled through the arts.

However, do you think it is a case where one happens at the expense of the other (that is, you can't excel at both), or a case where they mutually support each other (for instance, engaging in the arts might increase one's magical skill)?