Off to see the wizard...

the wonderful Michel Cantal-Dupart

Molly Rose Kaufman and I are off to see the wizard, Michel Cantal-Dupart, magician of cities, who has been our teacher for many years. I am reminded of the next lines of the song,

If ever, oh ever, a wizard was, The Wizard of Oz
Is one because, because, because, because, because, because
Because of the wonderful things he does

Like win the Dwell '“Nice Modernist” Award, the Legion of Honor, etc!

I have traveled much of France and some of the United States with Cantal, marveling at his insights into the dynamic relationship between urban form and people’s health. He has astounded me on every occasion since I first started shadowing him in 1996. Our first randonnée was in a Wrld War II jeep that Cantal drove through the forests and villages around Saugnac. We went to see magical wells, each of which was able to cure a particular illness.

He taught me to be a “flaneuse,” strolling streets and reading their fortunes. I have shadowed him for so many years because I realized that what he knew about cities would hold the key to the restoration of our broken urban areas. I’ve been able to write about what he taught me in my “urban restoration trilogy”: Root Shock, Urban Alchemy and Main Street. I think that studying with a magician is a particular kind of learning. I don’t know how to do the magic that he does, despite years of study. I just learned how to do the magic that it is in my power to do. Emily Croy Barker, in her wonderful book, A Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic, and the sequel, How to Talk to a Goddess, writes about this as her heroine, Nora, masters her own magic, which follows dreams and metaphors to get to its aim.

Cantal has promised a “program” for our visit this week — we’ll see what delights are in store.