Tarot Cards

In 2000, I decided to make a tarot deck as birthday gifts for my friends. Well, ok, I'd wanted to do it for some time. When I was a child I tried to make a deck after reading a Princess of Flames, a fantasy novel by Ru Emerson. Two cards later, meticulously traced and colored with felt pen, I gave up. 

However, scanners and Photoshop make art possible for the drawing impaired.

I've always loved symbolic imagery. Stories of transition, change. I'm particularly drawn to juxtaposition. People floating in clouds, a lake under a night sky reflecting a summer day. Ovid's Metamorphosis. That kind of thing.

Anyway, click to see larger versions of the files and a brief explanation of my thought processes for each. 

And for more on my interest in legends and myths, check out the Morad Roel, a book a revised myths my friend Barbara (the page of pentacles) and I wrote in college.