Tarot art experiment

[pyraxis]

I've been researching tarot symbology and art recently. I'm thinking about a Karnese interpretation, how it would work to use the tarot system as a vehicle for representing Karnese culture.

I did this sketch tonight as an experiment for the eight of swords, which would be a griff card. A story about a griff that may not fly. It's not finished, but I'm curious what people think.



Edit: slight update to the pic.

Comments

[tigerweave.livejournal.com]

Hey wow. Just a quick scan of my friends' page before I go to bed and I see this.

I find it confronting. Like really confronting. I read the eight of swords meaning and I realise why. Wow. Powerful. And powerfully interpreted in your piccie. j-t, I don't really understand the connection/interpretation of the Karnese culture, but I would love to know what you mean by that.

Verdigris wants to know what medium you used.

Hey there is a whole lot of symbology about broken feathers. That one underneath the other has its stem broken. Is that alluding to the symbology?

When I read cards for someone I just let the card itself speak. And what this one tells me is if only she could see or sense well enough to not hurt herself in the process, she could use the swords to cut the bindings.

Kewl ...

:-)

- Leonie

[pyraxis]

And what this one tells me is if only she could see or sense well enough to not hurt herself in the process, she could use the swords to cut the bindings.

Heh, I thought the same thing when I was watching her paint it, that the woman should just cut the ropes on the sword that's right there in front of her. Blindfold or not. She'd probably get cut less that way than if she tried to squeeze through without unbinding herself first, like the writing on the site said to do.

- Pyraxis

[tigerweave.livejournal.com]

Yeah. Inneresting interpretation of what she should do on that website. Like ... a bit um... boxed in, or not creative approach to the situation.

Or to unbind her ankles too and stand up and step over them.

[pyraxis]

I find it confronting. Like really confronting. I read the eight of swords meaning and I realise why. Wow. Powerful. And powerfully interpreted in your piccie.

Thank you. :)

It's digital matte painting. Wacom tablet and Photoshop.

The broken feather was supposed to mean not being able to fly. That's why the sky-coloured cloth that's unraveling too. But I just looked it up and in Native American culture it's come to mean flight and messages in the spirit world too. In Central America it might be related to Quetzlcoatl. I found one source that says an eagle feather that's stripped right up to the black tip and then the tip is broken and dangling represents a scout who has discovered a lot of enemies (smoke-blackened housetops).

j-t, I don't really understand the connection/interpretation of the Karnese culture, but I would love to know what you mean by that.

I want to make a cleaner bridge between Karn and the, what's it called? Collective unconscious here. I think that would communicate the ideas a lot better than trying to translate everything into words. I've been getting screwed up a lot because I know how to make a piece of art appeal to one person, but not to people as a whole, and then when it appeals to the one person I get too scared to show it to them because they'll ask lots of questions that will hurt. So then it's like you said to me once, I don't show my art to very many people, and that's why it's not popular or successful. I have to fix that.

- j-t

[liminaltime]

I really like it. It has a lot of emotion pouring out of the card. I also like the feathers scattered in front to prove the point that she is flightless right now.

[pyraxis]

:D

Hey miss you. You took your fantasy life underground again. Was there not enough richness out here?

- Daria

[liminaltime]

I've missed you too! Don't get me wrong, the world is full of plenty of richness, and my fantasy life (and the people in it) are alive and well. I think they are still trying to beat down some embarrassment and shame barriers, and worries about being welcome. Perhaps I should liken my fantasy life to a barn, open it up, and chase all the livestock out. ;)

[pyraxis]

Glad of it. Hey Deborah, Loudon, Avery, Lil, you're totally welcome round here. There, I miss anyone? Nobody wants to get their cow butt smacked on the way out of the barn, do they? :D

[liminaltime]

Oh, there are others who come around less. Like Jackie, Christian, Bridget... and other satellite friends and family members. And then when I write another series, there will be a whole new crop of people yet to be discovered. We'd better chase them out of the barn too!

[dfotw.livejournal.com]

I really, really like it. I love how you've managed to give it your very personal twist (though I know nothing of Karnese culture), and yet retain the feel and meaning of the original card (well, 'original'...).

And I love the bird skull on the pommel of the sword on the foreground!

[pyraxis]

The Karnese are a shapeshifting people. There are four shapes known (well, "known"... *grins* I know at least one other, 'cause it's my shape. I'm from Karn.)

But the griff are warriors and they love nothing more than soaring away through open sky. So to pin them down in a place so small they can't shift into their griff form, that's one of the worst things you could do.

Awesome catch on the bird skull.

- Daria

[jimnightmare.livejournal.com]

Holy crap j-t, that's just a sketch and not finished yet? XD You do crazy things with mood and color and I like how the back is all blurry compared to the front, it's like you squished a painting and a photograph into one thing. I really like it. Are you going to do more Tarot cards?

[pyraxis]

Holy crap j-t, that's just a sketch and not finished yet? XD

Yeah XD. But maybe I should leave it blurry like that. I want to fix the ground, though, because it was supposed to have a dirt texture, and I have to fix her hands, and the sketchy lines in the cloth in the top right.

I really want to do more cards. Still thinking about which ones to look at next.

- j-t

[cedarwolfsinger.livejournal.com]

OMG! This is frigging AWESOME! I love it! The captive seems to be thoughtful, or in trance, rather than afraid. It almost appears that she (? is it a she?) is reaching out with "other senses" to feel where the swords are so she can cut the ropes without serious injury. They've given her the means to get out -- the cage is also the instrument of release -- if she can only access it. And from the almost a smile on her face, I think she will...

[pyraxis]

Wow. ...Thank you.

It is a she, though it doesn't have to be.

I hadn't thought about her being in trance rather than afraid. I'm so happy that everyone who looks at it has been able to see something different in it.