Research Approach

For this project, I was asked to research the life of Harry Houdini. My central research method was to use the internet to find images associated with him and find large databases of biographical information. The fascination with Houdini, both during his lifetime and continuing to the present day, is a response to the large number of cultural structures that he embodies:

• The concepts of performance and 'The Performer'
• Celebrity
• Magic and mysticism
• The subculture of the psychic
• The blurring of fact and fiction, reality and conceit
• The space and staging of 'The Escape'; daring, risk and bravery

During my research, I became particularly interested in the circumstances surrounding his death, and his immediate posthumous legacy, especially his instruction to his wife concerning after-death communication via psychics, as it seemed to tie together several core themes; violence, falsity, performance and the background of a mystical Eastern European heritage (exoticism).