|
by Carol Herzer
Many years ago, way back in the 1960's a
special friend gave me a tarot deck. Mysteriously it disappeared a
couple years later, and when I replaced it the colors were different. I
remember a vivid dream I had after that, the deck came to life and the
cards themselves all became beautiful paintings. It was a powerful
dream, and I wanted to go back into the dream, I wanted to see those paintings
again. I knew it was a very special dream, more real than life, but I
did not yet know the significance and how it was a window into the
future for me.
In 1969, still in college, I took a printmaking
class, and there I made an etching, I decided to do the
tarot major arcana. I titled it TARO, and the seed was planted, within a
year a new painted version of it was begun my Astrotaro. Years passed, and
by the mid 1980's I had completed the Astrotaro. this was followed by
a larger version of the majors paintings, the Cosmo Meditations. The
time came where I was searching for other tarot decks to paint. Guido Gillabel,
the older brother of a man I would later marry, had contacted me by mail
from Belgium. First I painted his Cosmic Egg major arcana deck. I asked him
if he had
more for me to paint, and he, being a printer, and a collector had lot
and sent me some sets of black and white prints of major arcana decks to
explore.
Among this was a small black and white majors set of the RWS
deck, a copy of a set widely used in Europe for students of tarot. I made
black and white copies enlarged on a Xerox copier to 5 x 7, printed on
Linweave paper, and made
two paintings of each of the majors. I
decided to go on and next I did the court cards. Finally I did the
minors, Aces to 10's, to complete the entire 78 card deck. It took me a
little over two years, from 1987 to 1989, to do the basic painting the Illuminated
Tarot. I continued to alter and refine the paintings for
several years after that.
The
original paintings for the Illuminated tarot are on a textured paper called Linweave,
giving a very fine almost canvas like surface. I taped
each card down separately to a piece of thick cardboard and started to
paint with acrylics. My approach to painting was influenced by applying certain techniques of painting I learned
in Austria from Ernst Fuchs, who taught me the misch technique, a 15th
century painting technique using layers of colors. I gradually built up
the colors and effects, working to create space and light. I let my
imagination go and added elements of energy and rays of color and light.
My main focus as a painter has always been landscape and people, so this
deck was perfect for me to develop the images, and I felt the treatment
in the commercial decks was so lacking, that the drawings of Pamela
Coleman Smith had so much more potential in them, as real paintings.
She did not have the materials available as I do, with acrylics to
paint, making it possible to create as I did. We know that she said she
was paid very little for a very big work, that of just creating the
images, the drawings, and it does not take much to figure that there was
no budget for her to make full paintings out of each card.
As I painted psychic and healing energy found its way into the cards. During that time, Neptune was conjunct the moon in my birth chart, perhaps
the most psychic of all transits. Also at that time, a neighbor's child
was seriously injured. Every day I, along with others, sent heartfelt
energy for his healing. This was a very emotional experience, and I
could just feel the energy of love and healing as I thought about the
little boy and sent it in his direction. Now that I look back I can see
how this affected the energy of the Illuminated Tarot paintings that I
was doing at the same time. (His healing was near to miraculous.)
I
painted the deck in parts, first the majors, then the courts, and last
the numbered minors and I like to look at the cards as connecting to the
elements associated with each suit. In my Astrotaro deck the signs of the zodiac are
aligned with the courts, so I did the same with the Illuminated and
early decks had signs on the titles of the court cards. At first I looked at the cards in groups by suit, focusing on the
elemental energies of each suit: fire, earth, air, or water. Later on
when I did the minor arcana I also looked at them in groups by
number, all four aces, all the twos, etc.
I
started making handmade decks with photographs in the 1980's. I always did all my own photography, working
outside with natural sunlight to get the
best colors and keep things lined up and square. Because I got a much
better price on multiple prints the first time through I ended up photographing
the deck many times, printing around ten decks at a time. Some turned
out better than others, and there were problem cards where certain
colors did not reproduce well. Also, with
photography there never were true white borders or clean whites in the
images. I continued with the painting, and altered colors in the
originals in order to get better results
in the photography. This was a good thing, it made the overall color
balance much better in the deck as a whole.
I now make decks with
laser color copy printing at a shop with a big professional printer over
the years there have been changes At first it was a Canon, that was
replaced, and now it's another brand, colors have gotten better over the
years and they are a lot faster. The colors now are much closer to the original artwork, so
much better than the photography, with real whites on the borders! I can print decks as I
need them, a few at a time. The copies are laminated with the best lamination available,
and we now have our own machine for that with rolls of film, not the
home sandwich style that is often too stiff. My decks are very flexible
and shuffle well. The cuts are perfectly
straight, I use a professional guillotine hand operated cutting machine
like the ones you see in print shops. Corners are rounded using a little
corner clipping machine we now have. I used to use vinyl backing added
to the cards, but now i print the backs at home on our high quality
Canon 900 printer, and i give a choice on the back color for a lot of
the decks, but not all of them. After the decks are made I like to set the cards under a
heavy crystal for a few days to charge them up. When I make a cloth bag
I go on a search through my fabric collection and allow people to choose
color and pouch card choices, if it is available. It is adhered with a
mounting material called twin-tack, though at times I leave the bag
undecorated. I have found that when I customize decks, giving people
choices in backings, color of pouches, and the card on the front the
results are much more fun and interesting than otherwise. I enjoy making
decks, and offering something unique and special to the true lovers of
tarot.
At a certain point I
started to experiment with adding
iridescent colors in by hand. these are also known as "interference "
colors. the have a pearl like quality that catch the light. one thing
led to another, and I noticed the order of colors I used made a
difference in the overall look of the deck. I let people tell me their
preferences. that led to some wild requests. First came fire, A deck
with fire colors. I painted into the cards a bit more, using regular
paints too, working directly on the prints made for the deck, on paper,
not the original art of the original version deck. Next came a request
for a deck of ice and snow. Lots of blues, I know this would be a big
work, but I was into it, and wanted to do it. However, I kept the first
set and made copies from that. Now I have al of the various versions I
offer. After ice and snow, Deep Crystal, I was asked for a deck of the
colors of the elements, but not the astrological colors, instead the
colors of ritual magic. so the Elemental Visions now Elemental Rainbows
was born. then in 2009, exactly 100 years from the publication of
the Rider Waite deck in 1909, somebody wanted just a bit of sparkle on
their Star card. Very quickly I fell into full glittering, and that took
off like a shooting star flying through the sky. the glitter is painted
on by hand, I do not sprinkle it, no, I mix it with clear gloss acrylic
medium and some water, and paint it on with a brush. Some decks got both
glitter and iridescent. the inspiration for a night sky Starlight deck
was felt, and I crated the Starlight version. borderless decks were
being asked for , I was able to go digital with that one and made it
borderless , also the Deep Crystal borderless was possible. In 2016 felt
I needed a break. At that time I did some just painting of my own, and
discovered fluorescent paints. I use them to amplify the colors, and am
still exploring the possibilities there. Because I have remained
independent and my decks are just made by me I have been able to expand
into a very creative and diverse realm. It is my dream manifesting. It
is endless, just like the dream, the images and paintings just kept on
coming.
A version of this article first appeared in
Geraldine Amaral's "Celebrating the Tarot a Journal for Tarot Enthusiasts"
cherzer@outlook.com
|
