Posters from the Golden Era of Theatrical Hypnosis
Few fields in the human knowledge and amazement are so suitable for stage as is hypnotism. His blend of mistery and humour, "instruction" and comedy, laughs and mysticism made it one of the most popular features of the fair tradition and of the vaudeville era.
Any performer with a minimum of stage charisma, without singing or acrobatic abilities, could turn himself into a professor of psycology or a sorcerer of somnolency. They baffled science.
Out of the theatre, once at home, endless booklets filled libraries or mail boxes tring to theach "how to" hypnotize.
Later, space-age popular culture propelled the mitology behind this modern science from the rasputinian mesmerizers to the abducting aliens, up to the tv screens, without diminishing his power.
Ridiculizing each other is probably one of the hidden desires of this umanity, and we give to the mystic on stage the right to officiate those humiliation for an evening of innocent entertainment.
Hypnotism remains today an entertainment form for cruise ships, tv show or corporate events. Even with peculiar exponents, it rarely preserves the limelight fascination and the imposing imposture of the vaudeville scientists, dime-show decorated ministers or mesmeric masters.
Few fields in the human knowledge and amazement are so suitable for stage as is hypnotism. His blend of mistery and humour, "instruction" and comedy, laughs and mysticism made it one of the most popular features of the fair tradition and of the vaudeville era.
Any performer with a minimum of stage charisma, without singing or acrobatic abilities, could turn himself into a professor of psycology or a sorcerer of somnolency. They baffled science.
Out of the theatre, once at home, endless booklets filled libraries or mail boxes tring to theach "how to" hypnotize.
Later, space-age popular culture propelled the mitology behind this modern science from the rasputinian mesmerizers to the abducting aliens, up to the tv screens, without diminishing his power.
Ridiculizing each other is probably one of the hidden desires of this umanity, and we give to the mystic on stage the right to officiate those humiliation for an evening of innocent entertainment.
Hypnotism remains today an entertainment form for cruise ships, tv show or corporate events. Even with peculiar exponents, it rarely preserves the limelight fascination and the imposing imposture of the vaudeville scientists, dime-show decorated ministers or mesmeric masters.
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