Provoking the Freeport Magic: Art Assemblage in Late Capitalism

How practices that enact the art of constructing open secrets in markets can be mobilized to unfold magic making.

What is magic? And what can it do? In this book, Jessica Backsell interrogates the magic of the art world and culture’s stubborn habit of foregrounding art as representative of an alternative value system. Through the empirical example of the freeport—luxury warehouses where valuable art is stored for preservation and taxation purposes—Backsell explores the implications of unders...