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I followed this deck from the time that I found out about it.
Everything about it is incredibly powerful - which is exactly what our
connection with Gaia (Mother Earth) should be! Every card carries
potent magick - of this world, the Otherworld, and the world
"in-between". Gaia and all of her inhabitants are honored in a very
humble manner. Every voice speaks clearly - the standing people, the
fur people, the feathered people, the finned people and the plant world
- all are honored, each through their own voice.
Look closely at each card, and see the levels of meaning that come
shining through. Each level supports another, and all are crafted to
work together. These are voices of harmony - which, if paid attention
to, will bring harmony to those that honor and respect them. I am not
forgetting the Goddesses, for they play a very important part in this
deck. Their voices, and their energy, come through in harmony with the
voices and energy of their respective ally's.
I have babbled on enough - it is time to let Joanna, who has graciously
agreed to talk to us, tell her story.
BC: When did you decide to craft a deck of your own, and how did this particular theme come into being? JPC: I first started to think about creating a deck of my own in the early 90's when I was immersed in teaching Goddess studies and Tarot classes in the Northwest. I loved the worldview and counsel of the Motherpeace deck but had a hard time with the style of the artwork. Since I was already doing Goddess/Pagan art, I was of course intrigued by the idea of doing a deck. But I was daunted by the scope of it. At the time I was volunteering the equivalent of a full time job for the Beltane Papers magazine on top of working for a living, so I wasn't able to put the necessary time in to create a deck. I did start making files of ideas, though. Around 1998 I was burned out on teaching and volunteer work, and just stopped doing both. I also went on an "oracle fast" at this time. I gave away most of my Tarot decks and stopped my astrological studies. Letting go of teaching and the divinatory arts opened up a lot of new space and energy in my life. Two important things in my development happened during this time. I discovered colored pencils as an art medium, and made the transition from pen-and-ink to colored pencils. It was my good fortune that the top colored pencil portrait artist and teacher in the country, Ann Kullberg, lives in the Seattle area and I was able to study with her. I learned her techniques and applied them to my own style and subject matter. I still take advanced classes from Ann whenever I can. (www.annkullberg.com) The second thing that happened was more philosophical. I have always loved nature -- it's one of the reasons I self-identify as a Pagan -- but I had an awakening regarding my relationship with the natural world. I realized that I, like many modern Pagans, was clueless about the real natural world around me. I knew a lot about the symbolism and mythology of all kinds of plants and animals but very little about the woods, birds and animals where I lived. I read Chas Clifton's article "Nature Religion for Real" in Gnosis Magazine (www.chasclifton.com/papers/forreal.html) and it hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks. A short time later a "chance" conversation led me to the Wilderness Awareness School (www.wildernessawareness.org) and I enrolled in their correspondence course. I didn't finish the course but switched instead to studying with a local school, Wolf Camp. (www.wolfcamp.com) This led to a few years of intense immersion in nature journaling and the study of the Place where I live, which continues to this day. My interaction with the natural world is now the keystone of my spiritual practice. I was very heartened to learn that Starhawk was following a similar path, and also studied with the Wilderness Awareness School. I heard that she said something along these lines: "The book of nature is our holy text, and most Pagans are illiterate in it." That's a paraphrase and unfortunately I don't remember exactly where I heard it. But it became a kind of motto for me -- I just didn't want to be illiterate in my religion's holy book anymore! Starhawk's new book, The Earth Path, is about these same issues. (www.starhawk.org/writings/earth_path.html) I'm very glad that she has such a huge audience who will listen to her and hopefully follow her lead. In the fall of 2000, I was invited to be the Artist Guest of Honor at a conference held by the Midwest Pagan Council in Chicago. I was showing my artwork the first night of the conference when a very friendly woman wearing a T-shirt with a sequined High Priestess tarot card on it wandered into my room. I liked her immediately. She looked around the room at all the artwork then turned to me and, with the voice of a priestess, said: "Have you ever thought of doing your own Tarot deck?" I heard resounding echoes inside my head -- I kid you not. She turned out to be Janet Berres, founder and president of the (now sadly defunct) International Tarot Society. We had a great conversation that evening. During the rest of the weekend, person after person came into my vending area and asked me: "Have you ever thought of doing a Tarot deck?" I think I stopped counting after the ninth person asked me that. Nothing like getting hit over the head by the Goddess. It seemed very natural to me to celebrate my newfound passion for the natural world with my love of Tarot art, and to combine the two in creating the Gaian Tarot. BC: Can you tell us a little about your personal background, and how it plays into this deck? Who (or what) in the Tarot world inspired you? JPC: I grew up in suburban Los Angeles and spent the first 38 years of my life in California. After spending most of the 70's in church as a born-again Christian, I discovered the Goddess movement in the early 80's and have been involved in that community ever since. My artwork has appeared in many pagan publications over the years, some now defunct: Circle, Green Egg, Of A Like Mind, SageWoman and PanGaia, among others. I moved to the Bellingham, Washington area in 1990 after falling in love with the land there. I was also connected via mail (no email in the 80's) to the women who were publishing one of the earliest journals of women's spirituality, the Beltane Papers. So I immediately connected with their community when I moved up here, and together we brought new life to the magazine. I left the magazine in 1996 to focus on my own work -- teaching, writing and artwork. So I moved from suburbia to a forested area outside a small city, then five years ago moved to a small island, population 800. I'm not a city girl anymore! Living here has changed me profoundly -- I am much more physically active than I was when I was younger, and I make an effort to eat local, organic foods and to support the local economy. I volunteer for local community groups on the island here too, working to preserve the open spaces as well as encouraging affordable housing and sustainable economic activity. My husband Craig Olson and I built our own house in 1999-2000. It's a strawbale house, and it took us over two years to build it. We call it a "handmade house," because we literally built it by hand. It is marked with our blood, sweat and tears (mostly Craig's). We gathered the stones for the fireplace from the beach, and the posts of the front porch are driftwood logs from the beach too. I made the stained glass window that graces the front door, and did almost all the tile work inside. Ours was the second strawbale house on the island, and now there are three with one more in the works. That's a pretty high percentage for such a small population! My card "The Builder" (aka the Emperor) grew out of this experience -- Craig posed for it, and 90% of that image is true to life. It's our front porch. "The Gardener" (aka the Empress) is an homage to my organic farmer friends, as well as friends who have a native plant nursery. "The Teacher" (aka the Hierophant) grew out of my nature studies with Wolf Camp and the Wilderness Awareness School. "The Hermit" was inspired by the practice of going to a "secret spot" in nature and observing the seasonal changes there through journaling. "The Canoe" (aka the Chariot) grew out of my love for kayaking; that's our island in the background. The paddler is a young native friend who carved his own cedar canoe and paddle, and participates in inter-tribal canoe races and journeys. I've written quite a bit about the Death card in my online journal (http://gaiantarot.typepad.com/artists_journal/2004/05/ tarot_death_car.html); I really did come across a dead heron laid out in an old decaying boat one bright spring morning. Not every card came so literally from my everyday life. The Hanged One (aka "The Tree"), for example, is pretty much a work of the imagination. But even in that image, the bigleaf maple tree lives here on the island, and the tiny chickadee feeding in it upside down is a common sight. In the Tarot world, I've been quite inspired by the wild creativity of independent deck creators like Arnell Ando, Ellen Lorenzi-Prince (Tarot of the Crone), Lunaea Weatherstone (Full Moon Dreams Tarot), Lorena Babcock Moore (Ironwing Tarot) and Marie White (Mary-El Tarot). Their decks each have a unique vision and focus, and the execution of each vision is stunning. I would add Sally Anne Stephen's forthcoming "A Fool and Her Friends" deck to this list, as well as the work that Kevin Quigley did for the Patchwork Tarot (a collaborative deck on the Comparative Tarot list). I look forward to the day that Kevin does his own deck. For decks by larger publishers, I have long loved and worked with Motherpeace and the Greenwood Tarot and, more recently, the World Spirit Tarot. Alexandra Genetti's Wheel of Change Tarot is inspiring in its philosophy and worldview, as is Rachel Pollack's Shining Tribe. I love the artwork and history of Brian Williams' Renaissance Tarot. And I'm quite excited about Ciro Marchetti's work-in-progress, the Tarot of Dreams. The books of Mary K. Greer and Rachel Pollack were my first Tarot teachers and they continue to teach me to the present day. I've also been quite inspired by the workshops and books of Valerie Sim, Teresa Michelsen and Mark McElroy. What a wealth of Tarot teachers we have today! BC: You call your chosen work venue "colored pencil paintings". I look at these cards, and see level upon level of work. On your site, you explain the creative process that you go through in creating each card. Can you tell us a little about that? JPB: I learned the term "colored pencil paintings" from my art teacher, Ann Kullberg. Most people are amazed at the depth of luminosity and painterly effects that can be done with colored pencils. In the fine art world, colored pencil artists are still struggling for respect. Many galleries and art shows place colored pencil pieces in the "drawing" category instead of the more prestigious "painting" category, even though many pieces look like oil paintings. The Colored Pencil Society of America (www.cpsa.org) was formed partly to improve the reputation of colored pencil artists in the fine art world, and to expose the general public to the amazing work being done in this field. So being a colored pencil artist is a little bit like being a Tarot artist -- both are on the fringes of "respectable" society! ;-) I've developed a creative process that combines the art of digital collage with colored pencil painting. I take my own photos for the most part, although I do occasionally purchase stock photos or use copyright-free photos if I need to, for reference material. I work out the composition and color scheme of the piece in Photoshop, then make a line drawing in pencil. I hope to become more proficient in using a Wacom stylus and tablet, but for now it's important to me that the "bones" of the piece are done by hand with a graphite pencil. After I finish the line drawing, I scan it. I then apply flat areas of color (no shading) in Photoshop and print it out on my good drawing paper (Rising Stonehenge). From there, I complete the piece in colored pencil. There are 3 to 12 or more layers of colored pencil in most pieces. The pigment is translucent, so that's how you build up these rich tones of color. Most of the originals are about 12" x 18" in size, although a few are larger and some are smaller. I'm beginning to experiment with more of a marriage between the digital and traditional mediums. Many of the pieces are 100% colored pencil -- the High Priestess, the Hermit and the Moon, for example. But Temperance, which is the last piece I did, is about 85% or so colored pencil. I scanned the completed artwork and added the final touches in Photoshop -- the rainbow, the steam, the full moon, the radiance behind her head and the glowing third eye. Bindweed (the Devil) is also a marriage of digital and traditional methods. I expect this method to evolve as I work on the Minors. BC: The process of drawing the face of the High Priestess is something that you shared on your site. Can you tell us a little about this - and the reasoning for it? JPC: The High Priestess is my signature card for the creation of this deck. To me she symbolizes the intuitive ability of the priestess/artist to go down into the depths and bring back mysterious gifts for the benefit of the community. The High Priestess is usually depicted as a maiden in contrast to the "motherly" Empress. When I was creating this card, I looked at it in all the decks I own. I really liked Alexandra Genetti's depiction of the HP as a crone in the Wheel of Change Tarot. As I was musing on this, I suddenly remembered a pen & ink piece I had done in 1993 called the "Crone of May." (www.jpc-artworks.com/gallery/maidens/cronemay.html) The inspiration behind it was the many stories in Celtic mythology that tell of young women turning into old hags then back again, like the story of Dame Ragnell and Sir Gawain, or the Hag of Winter who becomes the Maid of Spring. On a deeper level, this affinity between Maiden and Crone speaks to the independence that both have. A woman in the "Mother" or "Queen" stage of her life is actively nurturing, caretaking and involved in her community. But a young girl and an old woman have much more in common -- more time to call their own, less time and emotional energy given to meeting the needs of others. The High Priestess and the Star are my two best-selling prints. Many women who are around age 50 or older have seen the High Priestess and gasped, "that's me!" Some of them know nothing about the Tarot, but intuitively and immediately relate to the image. There's a whole lot of us who are experiencing the aging process as reclaiming the independence of our youth while moving into the proverbial wisdom of age. We are young and old at the same time. It's a mystery, is it not? BC: I am impressed with the manner in which each card has been presented in your accompanying book. Talking about the energy of the card, the symbols within the card, and then suggesting what the card might mean when it comes up in a reading. For me, this opens the door for each card to be what it is meant to be - which may be slightly different each time it appears in a reading. How did you come about this form of presentation? JPC: I thought about what I most appreciate in a deck booklet, and I included those elements. I want to know the deck creator's unique twist on the card and why she or he chose those symbols. Then I want to know the advice or counsel the deck creator would give. Whether or not the deck creator's counsel is something I can take to heart is a make-it-or-break-it test for me; that's usually the deciding factor in whether or not I can use a deck for readings. BC: When I received my deck, one of the things that touched me deeply was the inclusion of the herbal sachet, as well as the stone, shell and beach glass. How did you come to this selection of items? JPC: This island where I live is a source of great spiritual sustenance and blessing to me, as well as to many others who live or visit here. It's a magical place. I wanted to give some little part of the physical presence of the place to the people who bought the limited edition, as a blessing to them. I often walk the beaches to commune with the Ocean Mother, and picking up stones, shells and beach glass is kind of an act of devotion. The beach glass particularly is a token of the presence of the Ocean Mother. My friend Cedarwind, who introduced me to the island, made a pact with Lady Ocean years ago that she would stay on the beach each visit until she found at least one piece of beach glass. Sometimes it's very rare and the Lady keeps her there for hours! Other times she comes home quickly with her pockets stuffed to overflowing with beach glass. It's a practice I've adopted as my own. Beach glass begins as human-made litter and is transformed into something "rich and strange" by the Ocean Mother, then given back to us as a token of Her presence. The herbs first came to mind when I was designing the World card. Sage, cedar, sweetgrass and lavender are all used as purification and blessing herbs in various cultures and certainly in contemporary spiritual circles. I went out into my garden and picked a bouquet of the herbs, then to the woods for the cedar. I brought the herbs back to my studio where I drew them from life for the wreath on the World card. Later I realized that if I made a circular design with those herbs for the backs of the cards, it would be like a little miniature purification-blessing on each card. Later still the idea came to me to include a sachet of real, physical herbs in each bag. The sage, sweetgrass and some of the lavender came from my garden; some of the lavender came from fields in a farm up our hill, and the cedar came from the nearby woods. All were collected with reverence and prayers. BC: You mention on your site, and in the book that accompanies the deck, that the "Gaian Tarot" is meant to help connect us with the Divine, however we perceive it. You have done a phenomenal job with this, incorporating many different worlds of understanding. How did you make the choices reflected in this deck? JPC: Many of the symbols and design choices were made quite consciously, based on my years of Tarot study, Goddess herstory and cross-cultural mythology. I've been creating Goddess art for over twenty years, so I already had a wealth of knowledge at my fingertips. But a lot more of it was purely intuitive. I'm still amazed at what turned up in the images that I didn't put there consciously. For example, a friend of mine who had a print of the High Priestess asked me one day if I had put the "white cross with the red center" into the drawing on purpose, because that is a symbol that is very important to her. I didn't know what she was talking about until I looked at the image again and saw, for the first time, the white cross made by the priestess's white gown and the red pomegranate at its center. I asked the Goddess to guide me throughout the creation of this deck. (I also asked St. Pamela Colman Smith for a little help, too!) I feel like I did my part and She did the rest. BC: I know that the Minors for this deck are currently being worked on. Do you have any kind of mental timeline on this? (Hint: It will be a good idea to follow Joanna's site, as she will be putting up scans of the cards as she goes along.) JPC: I'm planning on two years to finish the Minors and accompanying book. That's about two weeks per card, which may be a challenge. We'll see. I plan to work part-time at my web design business and part-time on the Minors. I wish I could work on it full-time, but I do have those pesky bills to pay. The Minors are all planned out, but I have yet to start work on them. I'm still making the sets of limited edition cards! I do hope to have the full deck published by one of the major deck publishers. BC: What advice would you give to someone wanting to self-publish their own Tarot deck? JPC: Be true to your own unique vision! Don't create something because you think it will sell, but because it is an authentic expression of your own life and interests. If your chosen art form doesn't quite live up to the images you have in your head, take some art classes and work on your craft for a while. Then return to the creation of the deck. Ask for advice and help and support from others who have self-published for the nitty gritty details of deck construction and marketing. BC: I was delighted to see the inclusion of James Well's "Helpful All Purpose Spread", as well as the suggestion (from Valerie Sim of Comparative Tarot -www.comparativetarot.com) that when doing a full spread with another deck, the comparative method could be used by taking any Major's that appeared in the spread and drawing them from the "Gaian Tarot", using the comparison to amplify and deepen your understanding of those cards. How did this choice of inclusions come about? JPC: Valerie is one of my favorite Tarot people, and I have learned so much from her workshops on the Comparative Tarot method that it seemed like a natural to include it. James shared his spread on the CT list a couple of years ago, and it quickly became one of my favorite spreads. I asked him if I could include it in my booklet and he graciously agreed. I seriously doubt I could have come up with a spread any better! BC: Joanna - this is your time. Are there any last words that you would like to leave us with? JPC: In some ways I feel like this deck is the culmination of a lifetime of learning and teaching. I'm putting my own hard-won lessons into it, as well as the people and places that I love most in the world. I feel very grateful and honored that so many people have already been touched at the soul level by my offering of this deck. On a more mundane level, I've been surprised and pleased at how quickly the limited edition of 125 sold out, at such a high price. (Believe it or not, it cost so much to produce these decks that I made very little profit on them.) Since it will most likely be another two years before I even finish the Minors (and more time to see them in print), I've decided to publish a second edition of the Majors. The second edition will have smaller cards and will be less expensive. I'm starting a waiting list for the second edition and people can email me (joanna@gaiantarot.com to get on the list, or sign up for my newsletter on my site (www.gaiantarot.com). Thank you Bonnie for asking me such great questions!
I want to thank Joanna for graciously sharing her time and wisdom with us. The "Gaian Tarot" can be viewed at www.gaiantarot.com. I look forward to watching the progress of the Minor's for this deck. Without a doubt, I will want them to accompany their partner, the Major's on my journey with this deck! Joanna Powell Colbert is an artist and writer known internationally for her Goddess portraits and mythic art. Her artwork and writing appears often in the magazines SageWoman and PanGaia as well as many other alternative publications. Amber Lotus Publishers call her one of "the most accomplished and well-loved artists in the Goddess-spirit community."
Bonnie Cehovet
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