{"id":24100,"date":"2023-10-24T14:58:02","date_gmt":"2023-10-24T14:58:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/pegasus\/?p=24100&post_type=story"},"modified":"2024-05-21T19:36:19","modified_gmt":"2024-05-21T19:36:19","slug":"the-magic-touch","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.ucf.edu\/pegasus\/the-magic-touch\/","title":{"rendered":"The Magic Touch"},"content":{"rendered":"
At age 11, Kostya Kimlat \u201910 <\/b>became a student of his craft, learning magic techniques and sharing them everywhere, including online magic forums. After years of practice, he is now a master magician, motivational speaker and CEO of See Magic Live \u2014 as well as husband and business partner to former kid magician Amy Schwartz Kimlat \u201906<\/b>. Kostya\u2019s magic show brought them together in 2013. After their first date, they realized he had actually answered one of her magic forum posts years earlier.<\/p>\n
Seemingly a magical match, their shared interest has since evolved into creating incredible entertainment<\/a>.<\/p>\n For Kostya, a Ukrainian immigrant, that interest was sparked by an episode of The World\u2019s Greatest Magic <\/i>TV series. Soon after, he spent his time flipping through the pages of an eight-volume book set that his father gifted him, eager to learn the tricks of the trade.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I was 18 years old, I wrote my first book of card tricks. Then I got on a Greyhound bus and did a five-city tour to magic clubs, teaching [magicians] the tricks I came up with,\u201d says Kostya, who earned a philosophy degree<\/a> at 麻豆原创 in 2010.<\/p>\n While working on his degree, he spent 10 years traveling to 200 cities across five continents, teaching magicians various techniques and magic psychology.<\/p>\n Talented magicians were out there, but most lacked the necessary business skills to reach their full potential. So in 2010, Kostya launched See Magic Live, an Orlando-based network of magicians whom he trains for live events and coordinates national bookings. He also uses magic to teach perception principles to business audiences \u2014 a more fun way of challenging people\u2019s brains, like philosophy. Every performance empowers corporate teams to \u201cthink like a magician\u201d by seeing themselves through the eyes of their audiences.<\/p>\n