Most art is magick. It is the same combination of intention, discipline, will, and praxis designed to open up a conscious space in the present.
Read More"Keys of Solomon"
6 Witchy Spots You Must Visit in Philadelphia
4. The Strange and Unusual
This is a shop of oddities, antiques, taxidermy, and much much more. The entire shop is decorated in purple damask and velour fainting sofas. A stuffed grizzly bear wears a gold grown and lords over you as you browse through dusty ouija boards and spooky wooden dolls rocking in Victorian prams. You can spend a whole day here, flipping through the strange grimoires or asking the shopkeepers about the unique stories each object brings to the room. It’s an experience.
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Highgate Cemetery. London, England.
2 Books To Delight the Tombstone Tourist in You
Why would anyone go out of the way to visit a graveyard intentionally? In addition to the fascinating stories they contain, cemeteries can be open-air sculpture parks, full of one-of-a-kind artwork. They provide habitats for birds and wildlife, as well as arboretums and gardens of surprising beauty. Cemeteries appeal to art lovers, amateur sociologists, birdwatchers, master gardeners, historians, hikers, genealogists, picnickers, and anyone who just wants to stop and smell the roses. Our relationships with the places we visit can be deepened and enriched by learning the stories of those who came—and stayed—before us.
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Photography of Lotta Van Droom via Beautiful/Decay
Book of Shadows: Dream Reality by Tina V. Cabrera
Dreams are like music—you cannot explain what moves you or draws you to the melody. Dreams, like music, leave only an impression. Dreams are not the stuff of science or the intellect. Not any better or worse than waking reality, just different.
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Image from the Clavis Artis
Three Small Occult Presses You Should Check Out This Month
The publishers were generous enough to send me a copy of Wormwood Star: The Magickal Life Of Marjorie Cameron by Spencer Kansa to pore over and I could not have been more seduced by a book cover in my life than as I ripped open the package in frenzied anticipation. Marjorie Cameron’s hypnotic eyes starred back at me with such pull that I immediately dug into the pages.
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Can we talk about this GORGEOUS art deco dust jacket?
Interview with Author, Mortician, & Death Positive Activist Caitlin Doughty
Women’s bodies are so often under the purview of men, whether it’s our reproductive organs, our sexuality, our weight, our manner of dress. There is a freedom found in decomposition, a body rendered messy, chaotic, and wild. I relish the image when visualizing what will become of my future corpse.”
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Love Spell for Loving Yourself with Lana Del Rey's Cherry
Staring at myself in the mirror, I imagined I was singing these words to my reflection. And I did fall to pieces. I wanted to love myself with the intensity of the lovers in the song. It made me think of my love relationship with myself. I remembered that even on bad days, when self-esteem is running on low, I need to love myself fiercely.
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Photo Credit: Kyeon lucian Constantine
Berry Lip Stain Spell for Confidence
That’s what happens when I don lip shade, I create a change, a stirring within myself that promotes a certain kind of energy that I emanate into my immediate surrounding. I can change a color to suit not only my mood but also my desire for the conversion I seek within. It is confidence. It is magic.
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Photo Credit: The British Library
Fire Spell for the Dying Days of Summer
This time of year is erotic. The light forces us to engage with our bodies, our sexuality, our shadow self, our animal self. We shed clothes. We give way to our inhabitations. We blame the heat for kneeling to our desires. There is a darkness in this as much as there is light but unlike certain Puritan aspects of society that has taught many to reject this facet, I celebrate it.
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Natalia Drepina
How to Sew a Poppet
First, gather the supplies: soft fabric, a sharp needle, sturdy thread. Buttons, beads, and bits. Cotton scraps for the stuffing.
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Image from Runic Treasure
This Vintage Horror Tarot Deck Is Everything
The Major Arcana features poster art from the Golden Era of horror films, using mostly the monsters from the Universal horror series, and the Minor Arcana features screen grabs and promotional images taken from the same films. Just a few of the other more obscure films used in the deck are: The Mole People, The Infernal Cauldron, Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages, and The Golem: How He Came into the World.
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PHOTO CREDIT: Team Fisticuffs
The Inspiration Behind Beautiful, Occult-Inspired Tattoos
To me, there are such things is an nod to the imagination, the occult, belief in the unexplainable. I am fascinated in the pull of mystery.
Why not have a beautiful piece of art to carry a bit of mystery with you throughout your life?
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This photo is wrongfully attributed everywhere, but we believe it is by Daniel Vazquez. His work is at @AmericanGhoul
The One Time I Did Black Magic
Decided the full arsenal was required. Witchcraft. A black magick banishment spell. I would protect my land and bodily autotomy. Even if that meant I made an unholy deal with the Gods, Goddesses and ghosts. I would be as scorched earth forever alone if that would permit me to me survive. When I turned 40 I resolved to be a celibate recluse to preserve sobriety and avoid further rape. Sacrifice was familiar company. I had to salt the earth so no weeds could grow.
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The brides of Dracula from Tod Browning's Dracula (1931).
Why I Got a Dracula Tattoo
There are such things is meant to disrupt and challenge what you have always believed. There are such things leads you to think twice that that bump in the night is just the wind rattling the shutters and to scold yourself for thinking it could be anything but because, just for a second, you believed it was something that you couldn’t explain, something dark and unknown, something that would completely change everything you knew to be true. Changed what you knew about yourself.
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Cristina Gottardi
Brujas, I Won’t Tell You How to Make Your Magic
Bex vanKoot is writer, nerd, unicorn-lover, proud sjw, wannabe vampire/nazi slayer, and reluctant oxford comma user. http://bexvankoot.com
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