Vitaly Beckman treats magic as a form of art. Born in the Soviet Union and based out of Vancouver, the magician specializes in bringing drawings and pictures to life—an act unique enough that one of his illusions stumped professional debunkers Penn and Teller on a 2016 episode of their show “Penn & Teller: Fool Us.” Ahead of his An Evening of Wonders performance Friday, Jan. 26 at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center, Vitaly spoke with the Shepherd Express about his act, the difficulties of being a career magician, and why skeptical audiences are his favorite audiences.
What was the first magic trick you created?
I used to paint as a kid, so the first thing I wanted to do was to make a picture or a drawing come to life and become real. So one of the first things I did was draw a leaf on a notepad, place my hand over it, and there was a real leaf on the notepad instead of the drawing.
How long did it take to perfect that trick?
Creating it took me a couple of days, but perfecting that took me years. You know, magic is like music. Musicians play violin and they perfect their crafts for many years. They don’t figure it out in a day.
It seems like one of the challenges of using art as a medium is you have to be up close to see it. Does that limit your audience?
Not at all. I actually utilize that. I do it with people’s driver’s license. You know, you can pull out your own ID and your face will disappear from the driver’s license. That’s something very personal that can happen to anybody in the audience. I have people come up in stage a lot. Pictures can be big and we project stuff on stage, so everyone can see and even feel and touch it.
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It seems like being a magician would be a hard hobby to make a career out of.
Anything that’s unconventional is a hard thing to make into a career. It’s a business like any other business. Being an entrepreneur is always more difficult than finding a nine to five job. Especially in magic, where most magicians are either self-taught or have a mentor. I was self-taught, so learning things by trial and error is very difficult. But at the same time, it’s very rewarding to do something you truly love. They say if you love what you do you don’t work a single day.
Who do you think the best magician of your time is?
The best is so relative. I don’t like to look at it that way. I like to look at magic as an art form. I like to look at art as a form of expression. If it’s honest, that’s all that matters—if it’s honest and well done. So that’s how I like to look at magic. It’s a form of expression and a form of entertainment as well. I just create my own world where art comes to life, pictures come to life, things float, and people have things happen in their own hands in the audience.
Are there still magicians who really want the audience to believe they have special powers, or are those days over?
I think there are probably some. I like to call myself an illusionist because I don’t want people to believe that I have special powers. I just enjoy creating these illusions, but as you watch them, I want you to feel as if it’s real, to get that sense of childhood wonder again. It’s like an art form. When you watch a movie, you know that it’s not really happening, but it transforms you and makes you feel like you’re in that movie.
It seems like an odd time to be doing magic, because people are so skeptical these days. Online the internet tries to debunk just about everything, and people seem more distrustful of almost everything. Does that make it a harder climate to perform magic?
Actually, it’s the opposite. The more people that are skeptical, the better climate to perform magic, because there’s more interest in it. The more a person is skeptical and trying it out, the more amazed he’s going to be by the performance if it’s well done. There are usually two kinds of people in the audience. Ones that are trying to figure things out, the skeptics, and the other type are those who let go and just enjoy the ride. I like both. Those who enjoy the ride are a true joy to perform form, and so are those who are skeptics, because those people will react in the most amazing way, because they’re the ones who are blown away. The more attention you put in trying to figure out a trick, the more amazed you’re going to become, because it looks like true wonder to you. It’s human nature to always, throughout human history, to try to know everything, to try to figure out everything and to defy life. But it’s also the reality that there will always be mysteries in life, and there will always be questions unanswered. And magic is a way to remind us of that, and to celebrate the fact that we are human, and that it’s alright not to know everything because that’s what makes us human. So magic in a sense is a celebration of humanity.
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Vitaly Beckman performs his Evening of Wonders at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center on Friday, Jan. 26 at 7:30 p.m.
