Get to know
Jamy Ian Swiss.
Fast facts about Jamy
Born in Brooklyn, Jamy has performed worldwide — from Caesar's Palace on the Las Vegas Strip to Hollywood's Magic Castle to the Ginza District of downtown Tokyo — and today makes his home in San Diego.
Jamy was the subject of a lengthy profile in The New Yorker. Read it here.
Jamy’s made numerous television appearances including CBS 48 Hours, PBS Nova, CNN, and repeat appearances on The Today Show and The Late, Late Show.
The author of five books and contributor to countless others, he also writes and produces for television, including for Penn & Teller, and the Neil Gaiman series, American Gods.
The Full Story
An acclaimed master of the challenging art of sleight of hand, Jamy Ian Swiss has performed magic throughout the United States for presenters ranging from Fortune 500 companies to the Smithsonian Institution. And he has made numerous television appearances in the United States, Europe and Japan, including U.S. appearances on CBS 48 Hours, PBS Nova, and repeat appearances on The Today Show and The Late, Late Show.
A gifted sleight-of-hand artist who possesses, as the Washington Post once wrote, “a finely tuned sense of the absurd,” his wildly eclectic resume includes stints as a marketing consultant, telecommunications firm owner, wild animal handler, television writer and producer, editor of New York Times bestseller The Art of Asking by rock star Amanda Palmer, co-author of a chapter in Visual Explanations by information design guru Edward Tufte, and User Interface design consultant for Evernote. His greatest passion, though, is sleight-of-hand magic — he has lectured to magicians in 13 countries — and there are few practitioners who can match his skill and enthusiasm. With a bravado that reflects his early days performing in biker bars, Swiss blends contemporary comedy with bravura technical mastery to create a truly unique show that appeals to almost any audience. He has been called magician, comedian, artist; Swiss himself prefers the phrase “Honest Liar.”
An extensive resume of
real-world experience
Speaking Appearances
EG: The Entertainment Gathering, Monterey, CA
Serious Play: Art Center Design Conference, Pasadena, CA
Flash Forward Conference, San Francisco, CA
Adobe Distinguished Lecture Series, San Jose, CA
Electronic Arts, Los Angeles, CA
Intuit Inside/Out design conference, San Francisco, CA
Publicis, USA, New York, NY
Schlumberger, Ltd., Cambridge, UK; Greenwich, CT, New York, NY
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC [Masters of Magic series]
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC [Science and Pseudoscience series)
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
Sigma Xi, Maryland
Society of Applied Spectroscopy, Washington, DC
National Institute of Standards & Technology, Gaithersburg, MD
Edward Tufte Information Design Seminars, New York, NY; Boston, MA
Evernote Trunk Conference, Keynote. San Francisco, CA
Industrial: Trade Shows & Hospitality Suites, Banquets, Meetings, etc.
Beyond Trust, Duluth, US (RSA Conference, SF; Black Hat Conference, LV)
Vasco Data Security (HIMMS, Conference, Chicago; NACHA Conf, NOLA)
Teknion (Tableau Conference, Las Vegas)
Wherescape (Tableau Conference, Las Vegas)
Ausdia, Sunnyvale, CA (DAC conference, Austin, TX)
Shufflemaster, Las Vegas, NV [International Gaming Expo, Las Vegas]
Uniden Corp., Fort Worth, TX [Intnl. Wireless Comm. Conf., Las Vegas]
Cybermedia, Inc., Los Angeles, CA [PC Expo, Javitz Center, NYC]
XYZT Computer Dimensions, New York, NY [Laptop Expositions Show, Chicago]
Schlumberger, Connecticut & Oxford UK
Rand Technology, Irvine, CA
Citibank, New York, NY
American Express, New York, NY
Chemical Bank, New York, NY
Burson Marsteller, New York, NY
Engelhard Corporation
Prudential Insurance Co.
Gannett Publication, New York, NY
Warner Music International, Boston, MA
Apple Computer, Cambridge, MA
IBM Great Britain, London, England
Lego Corporation, Tarrytown, NY
Midwest Stock Exchange, Chicago, IL
AT&T, Basking Ridge, NJ
Film & Television
Merchants of Doubt, (commentator, feature-length documentary)
An Honest Liar, (commentator, feature-length documentary)
The Today Show, NBC-TV (Repeat appearances)
The Late, Late Show, CBS-TV (Repeat appearances)
Brain Games, National Geographic (“Brains Behaving Badly”)
Wall Street Journal Report, WNBC-TV, NY
The Art of Magic, PBS Documentary
Penn & Teller's Sin City Spectacular, FX Channel
Grand Illusions: the Story of Magic, 25-part documentary, Discovery Channel (Canada)
48 Hours, CBS News
Nova, PBS
Live at Five, WCBS-TV, NY
FOX-5 News, FOX-5 San Diego
NBC-7 News, San Diego
Tonight in San Diego, San Diego’s Late Night Talk Show
Good Morning America NY, WABC, NY
Houdini, Learning Channel (Library of Congress)
Magic: Illusion Design, Writing, Consulting & Lecturing
Editor, The Art of Asking by Amanda Palmer, NYTimes bestseller
Script consultant to Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, STARZ network
Advisor to American Gods (book) by Neil Gaiman
Writer/Producer/Director, The Virtual Magician starring Marco Tempest (aired in 50+ countries)
Creator/Producer/Writer, Cracking the Cons (Discovery Channel).
Comedy Writer & Chief Magic Designer, Penn & Teller's Sin City Spectacular (FX Network, 24 episodes)
Co-Producer, Monday Night Magic - NYC’s longest-running Off Broadway show, New York, NY
Co-Author, The Art of Magic, companion book to PBS documentary (GPG Publishing, 1998)
Co-Author with Edward Tufte of Explaining Magic (chapter) in the book, Visual Explanations (Graphics Press, 1997)
Creative Consultant to Penn & Teller's book, How to Play With Your Food
Magic Consultant to the United Artists feature film, The Fantasticks, directed by Michael Ritchie
Magic Consultant to the feature film, Highball, directed by Noah Baumbach
Magic Consultant to Rolling Stone magazine, Smashing Pumpkins photo feature by Mark Seliger
Author of five books, along with multiple booklets and monographs on magic for magicians; contributor to numerous anthologies.
Columnist (book reviewer) for GENII, The International Conjuror's Magazine, 1994 - 2013
Lecturer in 13 countries before thousands of magicians throughout North America, Europe and Japan.
Nominated as Lecturer of the Year, Academy of Magical Arts & Sciences (Magic Castle) Hollywood, CA