Joseph Pinetti

Joseph Pinetti
Occupation	Magician

Giovanni Giuseppe Pinetti, (Joseph Pinetti Willedall de Merci) was known in France as Chevalier Joseph Pinetti (1750–circa 1803). He was born in Orbetello (in Tuscany, Italy) and probably died in Russia. He was known as The Professor of Natural Magic and was a complex flamboyant personage. He performed in the later part of the 18th century and was the most celebrated magician of his time. He was the first magician to take advantage of advertising for the theatre.

The magician of the court of Louis XVI and then under the Directoire and First Empire, author of the Physical Amusments (1784), helped expand the art of magic and also created new effects. At the time, magicians performed in the streets as troubadours. While other performers carried their equipment in bags tied around their waist and carried their tables under their arms, Pinetti brought his experiments as he called them, into the theatre. His predecessors performed with brass and tin gadgets, while Pinetti’s was made of gold and silver. In his cabinet of curiosities, he claimed his tricks where based on controlled principles and presented them as scientific experiments. He was a short pudgy man whose demeanor was that of a king. During each performance he would change his gold-embroidered clothes three or four times throughout the evening.

He was a professor in Rome before he became a professional magician. He did tricks for his students and presented them as demonstration of physics. So successful was he that he soon reproduced those demonstrations for his friends. They encouraged him to do it for the public. By 1780, Pinetti was performing in Germany and billed himself as Joseph Pinetti, Roman Professor of Mathematics.

He did such tricks with the impressive name Theophrastus Paracelsus. Pinetti suspended a pigeon by a ribbon that was tied by his neck. A shadow of the bird was projected on the wall. He took a knife and slashed the shadow image of the bird’s neck and within seconds it was beheaded.

Professor Pinetti performed frequently in his theatre des Menus Plaisirs du Roi, in the suburbs of Paris. His stage setting was glorious while at the same time being straightforward. He had silk curtains around the stage, tables painted gold, and two crystal chandeliers hanging from above. In France, critics said that Pinetti’s opening night audience was large. They went on to talk about the twenty-three experiments the Professor demonstrated. Even though he only knew a few words in French, he had no problem charming the distinguished audience. He soon became the talk of Paris. So much so that the King commanded him to do a private performance for him.

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