When Dan and Dave do magic you attribute it to their ability to manipulate the cards. Even when they do an effect like "Static" the audience sees no reason to believe that they are using apparatus because they are convinced that these guys have that much control over the cards.
Is this the only way to create strong magic? No. But I believe, contrary to the classical mindset, that cardistry can be used to make card magic stronger.
To me, attributing magic (even card magic) to a skill makes it a little less entertaining. It no longer becomes witnessing the impossible but a demonstration of the possible.
Now, I think that a strong routine could be developed where cardistry and flourishes play a part. However, I don't think that most performers even come close -- its more like look at me juggle cards and now I'm going to do a pick a card trick and go into an ambitious card narrating what the cards do. I'm not saying that this is what you do, but it is the probably the way most of those performances go. It is like anything else in magic, it takes a tremendous amount of effort to do it right and make it work.
This has merit, I agree. Jerome Murat has one of the greatest presentations that argues this point. The same can be said for Marco Tempest. These performers have such strong messages that in the end that is what their magic is about. This is beautiful theater.
In magic we have the opportunity to tell a lie or do the impossible. I would argue that strong magic would convince the spectator that you could actually do what what you say you can. Teller said it better than me;
"In typical theater, an actor holds up a stick, and you make believe it's a sword. In magic, that sword has to seem absolutely 100 percent real, even when it's 100 percent fake. It has to draw blood. Theater is willing suspension of disbelief. Magic is unwilling suspension of disbelief."
I believe cardistry can be one way to make your card magic more believable.
I think cardistry can make magic seem more skillful and cause people to believe that you are accomplishing things using that skill. That may make it more believable, but not necessarily magical. We'll have to agree to disagree on that one.
My first preference is to not have the audience care how I accomplished anything. If they do care how I did what I did, I prefer to have the audience make up their own mind. I'm not going to tell them it's pixie dust or voodoo or skill. I just want them to see something that is impossible and just not know how it is done.
