News from Mark Mitton

The Towers of Light, which illuminate the sky over Manhattan every September 11th, are a very powerful and beautiful image. They make us stop and remember. This year, I happened to be driving back from a corporate show in New Jersey, and I took these pictures.

Jules Fisher, the award-winning lighting designer, explained the secret of creating the two parallel beams on the panel discussion about ‘Masters of Theatrical Illusion’ at the Philoctetes Center earlier this year. If you want to find out how he did it, check out the video on YouTube.

I am attending my first neuroscience conference in Edinburgh, Scotland, with my friend and fellow magician, Thomas Fraps from Munich. Peter Lamont, a psychologist and a magician, together with the Psychology Department of the University of Edinburgh, is one of the organizers. We are learning so much. My favorite talk was by Giacomo Rizzolatti, who spoke about his discovery of mirror neurons and his latest work on them. It’s fascinating stuff.

And what a beautiful city Edinburgh is! On my first night I was lucky enough to catch the fireworks over the castle, as part of the closing ceremonies of the Edinburgh Festival. The next day I visited Andrew Galloway, a student of the legendary misdirection expert John Ramsay, in the town of Ayr. We talked all day. I also went on an excursion to Rosslyn Chapel, the inspiration for the ending of the Da Vinci Code. Today Thomas and I did some sightseeing around town.

Here are some photos of the conference, the Camera Obscura, and Thomas and me goofing around at the castle: