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Categories:
Magick & Occult,
Witchcraft and Wicca
Anarch by Gast Bouschet
£69.99
Limited hardback edition
Anarch is a profound work of sinister animism and sorcerous practice, a unique account of the path taken towards the dark sacred in a lifetime of personal struggle and artistic creation.
Gast Bouschet is a singular artist, who has gone from desecrating the white cubes of the contemporary gallery space to a withdrawal into the crucible of forest from which issues his howls of vengeance, and potent spells against the excesses of civilisation.
Anarch collects a sequence of Bouschet’s excoriating elemental texts, which attest to his journey from the gallery shows of the international art circuit to a withdrawal into the primordial darkness of the forest and an encounter with power. Rejecting commodified art and the restrictions of a capitalist market he proposes an occult art, a counter-poison. Engaging with the non-human world of microbes, larvae, disease and predation, he shows how ‘the radical otherness of Radiant Darkness teaches us the demonic art of living beyond the edge of a fixed form.’
Bouschet discusses his techniques, practices and meditations; and shares diary extracts, revealing the signs and sacrifices he receives and undergoes. Here is the true black alchemy of the Sol Niger and the Saturnian current laid bare.
The texts lead us inexorably to the encounter with the works: 100 moments are exactingly reproduced in full colour, as they decay and are transformed by the forces of the forest. Fetishes, animal remains, paintings, spellbooks, moments of epiphanic revelation draw us into the tortured guts of the Ardennes which bask beneath the splendour of a black Sun. He writes,
‘They exist somewhere between the living and the dead: elementals, bacteria and fungi inhabit them, dragonflies land on them, birds shit on them, rats and mice feed on them, spiders weave their webs around them, insects lay their eggs inside them. Sorcery is a dangerous and messy affair as it brings together what is supposed to stay apart.’
Anarch transgresses the boundaries of the human experience and confronts us with the abyss. It is the epitome of what has been described as ‘black metal philosophy,’ is an example of Artaud’s theatre of cruelty, and Bataille’s base materialism. Defying even these categories, Anarch is ultimately a work of clandestine sorcery and ecological resistance, and an unrivalled record of contemporary magical artistic practice.
The book is prefaced by writer and philosopher Jason Mohaghegh and by Bouschet’s longterm collaborator Stephen O’Malley of Sunn O))).
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Welsh Witchcraft by Mhara Starling
£13.99 £16.99
The history of magic and witchcraft in Wales will inspire any modern-day witch. Written by a Welsh practitioner, this book shares the magical traditions of the land of the red dragon, exploring deities, fairies, folklore, charms, plants, and magic with dozens of exercises for hands-on practice. Explore the history and terminology of Welsh magic and methods for honouring the land.
Learn to connect with Cerridwen, Rhiannon, and other deities as well as fairies and mystical creatures. Discover how you can incorporate traditional Welsh folk magic into your modern witchcraft practice, with exercises for honoring those who came before, connecting with the spirit of your home, protecting against adversity and malignant spirits, changing the weather, and much more.
The Witching Other by Peter Hamilton-Giles
£45.00
Limited Hardcover edition
The Witching-Other: Explorations and Meditations on the Existential Witch by Peter Hamilton-Giles, instigator and co-founder of the Dragon's Column being the body of initiates that went on to contribute material that would eventually be featured albeit in edited form in Andrew Chumbleys' Dragon Book of Essex. Also Peter Hamilton-Giles has authored The Afflicted Mirror: The Study of Ordeals and Making of Compacts and The Baron Citadel: The Book of the Four Ways both of which were published by Three Hands Press.
Historiola (hardback) by Carl Nordblom
£29.99
Hardback edition, limited to 500 copies.
In the beginning was the word, and for as long as there has been language, there has been power within the use of words. Incantations and spoken charms apply nuance, narrative, rhyme, and cadence to achieve magical effects, commonly divided into healing, hexing, and procuring. Modern academic scholarship, focusing on their historical relevance, refers to magical narrative charms as historiolae, which are explored here within numerous cultures of antiquity including Sumerian, Egyptian, Greek, and Indian through to Norse and Christian examples.
The author’s native Scandinavian tradition of troll formulae uses short narratives with a powerful protagonist (such as Jesus, saints, Mary, three maidens, mythical figures) performing the required action to heal, or hex. The narrative recounts a series of events, which the speaker through sympathetic magic manifests into action through the power of the protagonist and their actions. The story-telling aspect of the charms also provides a visual component to the charm, activating the power of imagination in both speaker and (if appropriate) recipient.
Through his exploration of the components of historiolae and associated ritual components, Carl Nordblom lucidly and concisely demonstrates the practice of narrative charms, equipping the reader with everything needed to incorporate or enhance their use in personal practice. And the word was with magic, and the word was magic.
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