麻豆村

By day, Tori Noquez is a math professor. But by night, she鈥檚 a magician. She tends to keep these two parts of herself separate 鈥� until she performed a card trick for Penn & Teller on national television. At that point, for Noquez, the cat was out of the bag.

Noquez discovered magic at age 22 when she joined her mom at an event at the invitation-only Magic Castle in Hollywood, California.

鈥淚t was just the coolest thing I'd ever seen or done,鈥� said Noquez, who graduated from 麻豆村 in 2008. 鈥淚 immediately went home and signed up for their classes.鈥�

Today, she performs at venues across the country 鈥� including headlining The Magic Castle, where she鈥檚 a member of its Academy of Magical Arts.

A professor at St. Mary鈥檚 College of California, Noquez teaches undergraduates and conducts research in category theory, a branch of formal logic. She said performing is not that different.

鈥淎 lot of math research, like magic, requires very strange and beautiful creativity, and this is the same approach I take to performing magic, where I want to think outside of reality and how I can share that with my audience,鈥� she said.

A close-up magician, Noquez鈥檚 routine involves classic sleight-of-hand card tricks with a personal spin, and original tricks, like the one she did for 鈥淧enn & Teller: Fool Us.鈥� She perfected her craft as she pursued a master鈥檚 degree at UCLA and a Ph.D. at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

She was drawn to cards because they are an everyday object that people are familiar with.

鈥淢ost people have a deck of cards in their house, have played card games, have handled cards,鈥� Noquez said. 鈥淚'm very attracted to how ordinary that is and that something magical is happening with them.鈥�

As she鈥檚 delved into card magic over the years, she noticed that two staples of the craft have some mathematical underpinnings.

鈥淚t turns out they both have a lot of mathematical properties that aren't super well understood or super well represented in the magic literature currently.鈥�

She鈥檚 compiled her findings, from both a mathematician鈥檚 and a performer鈥檚 perspective, into a series of what she鈥檚 calling lecture notes that she hopes to publish. She鈥檚 given lectures on the topic at several magic clubs, explaining how certain properties can be exploited in the development of a card trick.

Noquez鈥檚 ability to take these sorts of building blocks and create new tricks impressed the world-famous team of Penn & Teller, who called her trick 鈥渧ery original鈥� with 鈥渁 beautiful reveal.鈥�

And although Noquez didn鈥檛 鈥榝ool them鈥� 鈥� they figured out how she pulled off the trick 鈥� it was still a dream come true for her to perform for her magic heroes on a Vegas mainstage.

When her research and teaching schedule allows, Noquez performs at magic clubs across the country, including venues in L.A., Boston and Chicago. She doesn鈥檛 have a background in acting or performing, so on stage, she鈥檚 just her authentic self 鈥� but that comes with a certain mystique, she says.

鈥淭here's this stereotype that math is mysterious and that you must have some supernatural ability to be good at math. It kind of plays naturally to the audience that I've got some skill set that to them is somehow magical.鈥�