 "Photo: Ken Muir")
Irving Quant is more than meets the eye.
The student illusion artist, who began practicing his tricks when he was a child, performed his show "Dreams and Memories" Friday and Saturday evening in the Student Union Building.
"Everything that could go wrong went wrong, but no one seemed to notice." Quant said, smiling. "I see what the audience misses."
The show - his first performance in Lubbock - included several acts, including card manipulations, bending a fork with his mind and walking on glass.
Quant, a junior business management major, was born in Lubbock but raised mostly in Mexico. He said he discovered his fascination with magic as a child but did not buy a magic book until eighth grade when he moved back to Lubbock.
The student council president helped him find his locker on his first day at Coronado High School, he said. At the time, Quant was holding two decks of cards and the older student asked him why he had them.
As it turned out, Quant said, the student was a magician and introduced him to a local magic club.
Amber Turner, a senior accounting major from Lubbock, said she went to junior high and high school with Quant but has yet to figure out his secrets.
"I don't know how he does it," she said, "because it's completely random - no mirrors, no magnets."
Turner said he has attempted to teach her card tricks without much success.
"Even the basic stuff I can't do," she said. "But [Quant] is excellent with cards. He does it all the time - throughout class or walking to class."
Although he amazes his friends and audience members, Quant said, after 10 years of practicing magic tricks, he is his worst critic.
"I'm always making new pieces, always trying to improve," he said. "The whole show evolves, and the next time will be more polished."
Quant said he practices a new routine between three and six months before performing it.
"It's always scary," he said, "because I never know if it's going to work."
At first, Quant said, he read books to learn new tricks, but now he creates his own from the principles he learned.
After attending Texas Tech for two years, he said, he took a year off to improve his skills as an illusion artist.
Fall 2008 has been his first semester back at Tech.
Of all the places he traveled, Quant said his favorite place to perform is Buenos Aires, Argentina, because of the people and the atmosphere.
He said he has had the privilege of meeting many famous magicians, but he admires his mentor Rene Lavand the most.
Lavand - an 80-year-old Argentinian magician who lost one of his hands as a child - specializes in close-up performances.
"He teaches me the philosophy of how to present things," Quant said. "He never tells me the methods, I know the methods."
Part of the advice Lavand imparted to him was to go back to college and finish his degree, Quant said, because it will function as a "safety net" if a career as a magician does not pan out. However, he said, his goal is to pursue a career either performing as a magician or using his business management degree to work with magicians.
"It's what's going to make me the happiest," he said. "Magic is not just about the illusion. Magic is about inspiration."
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