NOW YOU SEE IT

Columbus magician puts city under his spell after grabbing third place in the international “Olympics of Magic”

By Melinda Green / Photos by Aaron Massey

It’s not every day that you meet a full-time, professional magician. Erik Tait just might change that, someday, though, through his efforts in the industry.

“I think the thing a lot of people get excited about is that I’m a full-time, working professional,” he said. “My job is to go to an event and do magic tricks.” That means performing at private parties, corporate events, and especially magic theaters.

But performing isn’t his only job in magic. Tait is as multifaceted as he is skilled, with roles ranging from lecturer to podcaster to effect developer.

But first, the performing. Tait specializes in sleight-of-hand tricks, and he performs them at some of the most exclusive venues in the world. Take, for example, the Magic Castle in Hollywood, a private, invitation-only, club with a small, close-up gallery for the kind of work that Tait does best. Or the Chicago Magic Lounge, again with a gallery specifically designed for that close-up, sleight-of-hand work.

The second big aspect of Tait’s career is teaching and lecturing all over the world, formally and informally. He’s spoken at MAGIC Live in Las Vegas, and, in 2023, he’ll be speaking at Magifest in Columbus and at the Blackpool Magic Convention in England—the largest magic convention in the world.

He also hosts a sort of “jam session for magicians” on Instagram at 1pm Eastern Time on Mondays, exploring different ways to do card magic. Maybe a hundred magicians will tune in, but the recording stays up for a week and gets thousands of engagements.

Tait’s day job, though, is with Penguin Magic, the world’s largest magic retail company. Penguin builds and produces all kinds of magic tricks and effects right here, in Columbus, Ohio. →

↓ The third prize trophy Tait won in the Card Magic category of the 2022 World Championship of Magic

“It’s nice because it allows me to take on the gigs that I want to do,” he said. “If a big company calls me up and says ‘Hey, I want you to come out and perform,’ if the company doesn’t align with my values, then I don't have to say yes. It allows me to do charity shows, too—charities obviously can’t pay you what you’d like, but because I have a regular income from [Penguin], I can kind of do whatever I want.”

Unlike most magic companies, who manufacture overseas and warehouse stateside, Tait said, the vast majority of Penguin’s effects and props are handmanufactured by a team of magicians in Columbus (Clintonville, to be exact).

“I think that’s something that’s very important to magicians: to know that a magician actually handled and put together the prop.”

Tait develops tricks and effects that are then filmed in bars in the Short North and other trendy locations. “You can’t sell a magic trick if you can’t actually prove that it gets a reaction,” Tait said. “So we take them out, we film the performances, then we take it back to our studio and film the tutorial.”

Tait produces, directs, and edits the tutorial shoot, and even takes over the on-camera job as well if the person who created the trick isn’t comfortable on camera.

He also hosts the Penguin Magic podcast (“by magicians, for magicians”). The idea is to sell magic tricks, of course, but also to facilitate that late-night, 2am-ata-magic-convention conversation between two people. “It’s just this big, weird place for magicians to platform ideas that don’t fit neatly anywhere else,” he explained.

“We are in probably a new golden age for magic, from what I can tell,” he continued. “I’m very fortunate that Columbus is a big city that can support some really wonderful magicians. On top of that, more and more magicians are becoming popular on social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok.

“People are starting to get that magic isn’t for kids. Eight, nine years ago, I’d tell people I'm a magician, and they would go ‘Oh! My kid’s birthday party is in three weeks; you should really come

do something.’ And I'd have to launch into this long, weird explanation where I'm like ‘I do card magic that deals with time dilation, multiple reality theory, and principles of chaos. I don’t think your kid gives a shit that I can deal four aces from a deck at will.’”

In August 2022, Tait placed third in cards at the Fédération Internationale des Sociétés Magiques (International Federation of Magic Societies) World Championship of Magic, known informally as “The Olympics of Magic.”

“I went with the idea to participate, not to win,” Tait said. “These are the best magicians in the world. There were 150 competitors from 30 countries.”

A lot of those competitors were magicians Tait looked up to as a child.

“To actually win a prize in card magic is—not to toot my own horn, but it’s widely considered to be one of the most difficult to win a prize in, and one of the most competitive categories.

“To win that level, win that prize, is truly unbelievable. There’s no heats, or anything like that. You have one shot to go out there in front of a thousand magicians and lay it down.”

At an afterparty, somebody asked him “Do you understand that you’re the fourth American ever to stand on that podium, and the first one to do that in twenty years?” Other Americans have done well, but not in the card category. Tait recalled, “It was pretty overwhelming and humbling.”

So is he going to try again? “No. I’m done competing,” he said decisively. “It’s stressful and expensive, and the only thing you come away with is glory. It’s not like I won prize money for this. There’s no sponsors; no one was paying for the suits, or the music, or the supplies along the way. It was all me.”

Plus, he would need to come up with an even better idea for the next time, and it’s tough to design and perfect a trick good enough to stand on the world stage.

“Some of the best magicians in the world come from the United States; that’s not up for debate,” he said. “But they’re interested in paying their mortgage. If we could find a way to make competition more than just taking home a trophy, that would be fantastic. Whatever I can do to help future competitors is what I'm working on.”

Well, that, plus all his other ways of sharing, teaching, and advocating for magic, to be exact.

To learn more, visit eriktait.com ↓ Detail shots of Tait performing a card trick ↑