Tarot: the Magician and his Avatars – David Lynch’s Club Silencio

The Magician is the first tarot major arcana. In the Rider-Waite Tarot deck, the Magician is depicted as a young man, with the symbol of infinity over his head, standing behind a table on which are represented items representing the suits of Minor Arcana:: cups, swards, pentacles and wands. His right hand holds a magic wand rose toward the sky and his left hand points to the earth.









When speaking about the divinatory meaning of the Magician, A. E. Waite offers, in his book „The Pictorial Key to the Tarot “, several possible meanings: „skill, diplomacy, address, subtlety; sickness, pain, loss, disaster, snares of enemies; self-confidence, will; the Querent, if male“. However, for Waite, the main spiritual significance of the Magician is „ the divine motive in man, reflecting God, the will in the liberation of its union with that which is above“.

In literature, painting and cinema, there are many scenes that more or less accurately illustrate the meaning of this Major Arcana. One of the most impressive is the Club Silencio scene from Mulholland Drive, David Lynch’s 2001 movie, staring Naomi Watts and Laura Elena Harring.









The scene begins with Rita, one of the protagonists, waking up at two a clock in the night and insisting to go to a theatre called Club Silencio. On the stage of this theatre, a man seems to be playing with different realities or levels of the unconscious mind. He explains in several languages that everything is an illusion. There’s always music in the air, although there is no orchestra: „ No hay banda! There is no band! Il n’est pas de orquestra! This is all… a tape-recording“. Illustrating his words, a woman collapses while singing, but her vocals continue.

Inspired by Club Silencio in Mulholland Drive, David Lynch has opened a nightclub with this name in Paris, in 2011.

Tarot masters about the Magician

The Magician – Interpretation and Meaning

David Lynch and astrology in Twin Peaks







