Artist Spotlight, Etsy: Animism Tarot Deck by Joanna

I have been toying with the idea of creating a tarot deck for many years; yet this is not a venture one should “toy” with. Creating a tarot deck requires spiritual fortitude, malleability (to conform to what the deck manifests itself as, as opposed to what you think it ought to become), and an insane amount of artistic talent- not to mention a great printer!

Canadian artist Joanna has superseded these feats with her stunning Animism tarot deck. Her animism deck is based off of Rider Waite’s interpretations, and the inane knowing of animal totems. Each image touches the onlooker with a keen knowing unbeknownst to the untrained eye, yet it’s clear to see an unimaginable will set to conquer the spirituality of Joanna’s heart; doing so has given life to a divination tool unstained with the blight of automation and production.

The Animism deck is great for beginning diviners seeking a beautiful deck with “classic” interpretations, especially for lovers of animals and fine art. (Check out Etsy’s Secret Santa extravaganza, if you’re lucky you may score some beautiful pieces that touch your spirit!) Joanna shares the same adoration for cuddly bunny rabbits that I do, and crafts pendants for pets passed on from this realm. You can visit Joanna’s Etsy shop, The Rainbow of Crazy to check out her other offerings, like this super amazing piggie print that makes my vegetarian heart soar!

Joanna:

The direction of this tarot was to bring the animals that I love together with tarot. Choosing the animals themselves was a very involving process, but when that was mapped out more, the rest of the process was a lot more loose and creative. I wanted to try to keep the basic meanings of the Rider-Waite cards and that definitely helped to guide the direction of each card. But I also wanted to make the deck feel more intuitive and even fun to use. I really wanted to have fun with this deck. I wanted to use different settings, different colours. So in the end each card doesn’t necessarily match the next, but I hoped to still have them flow together well and I think it worked out.

At the very beginning, I didn’t think about really making a tarot deck to sell. It started out as a personal project. It was more of a learning process for me, to learn more about tarot, more about myself, and to see if I could really complete an entire deck. I thought, what better way to learn even more about tarot than to create a full deck? My main goal with this tarot deck was to ultimately create a deck that I would want to use myself, something that I would be comfortable with and have a connection with. So having that idea in my mind helped me work through the creation each card.

Picking the animals to feature was a bit like connecting the dots. I had so many animals in mind – and really, the sky was the limit! What I wanted to do was to connect the traits and symbolism of different animals to the symbolism of each of the tarot cards. I also wanted to choose animals that ultimately just felt “right” to me. Sometimes it would take a long time to link a certain card to an animal, and sometimes I would immediately know what that link would be. Like the Fool tarot, I struggled for a while when it came to creating this card, but when the idea of a llama came up, I immediately knew it was my fool.

Choosing the animals was one of the most challenging steps. I would find that some animals could easily suit multiple cards; so the challenge was to dig a little deeper and see which card it suited best. Plus I didn’t necessarily want to always choose animals that seemed like the most obvious choice. For example, Strength does feature the traditional lion, but the Lovers are a pair of seahorses. I wanted a wide variety of animals.

To be honest, I never grew up with tarot or magick or knew anyone that had an interest in it. But I’ve always had a part of me that had an interest in the spiritual and the unknown. I still remember several years ago when I was browsing through an online community that I frequented, I found myself reading through the most fascinating exchange that was all about tarot. I searched online to learn more about it and my eyes were immediately drawn to all of the *amazing* tarot artwork that’s out there. I was basically in art heaven. But that night was the moment I found a connection to it. I still remember reading through people’s personal experiences with the cards and what tarot really meant to them. It wasn’t something dark and evil. It was personal and uplifting and it can be whatever you’d like it to be.

To stay abreast of Joanna’s projects and musing subscribe to her blog and follow her on Facebook, Twitter, & Pinterest, What do you think of her Animism tarot deck? Have you ever considered creating your own? 

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