Misha Hoo's Blog - Posts Tagged "black-and-white-designs"

"Wow these cards are different!" she said as she slowly shuffled through the black and white cards.
"I've never seen Tarot cards like these before."
"No, I made them," I replied proudly and thought back to how I first got the idea...

I was sitting in one of my favourite cafés in Amsterdam; Gary’s Muffins, which actually sells a lot more bagels than muffins but grew from humble beginnings as a coffee and muffin place and to this day has kept the name. The business was started by a couple of American expats so you can get as many toppings as you want as well as great service which is rare in the Dutch cafe scene.

I’d been reading Tarot cards for a while and used to set myself up in the massive Vondelpark on a sunny day, sitting on a blanket under a shady tree on my favourite corner of the winding path. The park was the closest thing to a beach there, and girls used to lay around in bikinis, guys were walking their dogs, playing ball, jamming on guitars, people were smoking joints and generally having an awesome time.

When I read Tarot for people I always explain the meaning of the cards, as well as the position in the spread, like “this is the goal, the principle, the idea position, this is what you are headed towards, and here you have the Fool card. So you need to reclaim your trust and innocence but be careful that you are not being naive….” I mostly used the Osho Zen Tarot when reading for others - it is a fairly contemporary deck and I found the pictures were easy for people to understand. A client would ask me what was holding them back and then the Guilt card would come out, complete with a picture of a scary, crazy woman with black eyes and long fingers scratching at her own hair, racked with guilt. They got the message loud and clear.

I had thought a lot about writing my own Tarot deck and the idea returned to me that day over caramel latte. Writing came easily to me and it had long been my personal passion. Words flowed into my awareness during quiet moments, sentences and paragraphs arranged themselves in my mind as I lay in bed at night. I wanted to write a modern Tarot deck, one that everyone could understand, a Tarot deck that might intrigue those who ‘weren’t into that stuff’, might influence someone to look further, dig deeper to find answers...

I was pretty confident that writing the deck would be easy enough, but illustrating it was a different story. All the Tarot decks I knew had detailed, intricate illustrations, some even reproduced oil paintings and all were way beyond my level of skill at the time. I considered my options as I stirred my coffee. I thought about the cards I knew and loved, the Medicine Cards popped into my mind – totem animals from North America illustrated with a bright yellow lightning bolt on the back of the cards. The lightning bolt is also the Japanese Raku symbol used in the ancient healing art of Reiki. It means manifestation, connecting heaven and earth, bringing inspiration into form.

It was then that I saw them – black and white symbols, circles, spirals, interwoven patterns flashed through my inner vision. I had seen these before somewhere…yes, at my friend Jakob’s house. He was a graphic artist and designer and really into geometric shapes. He had been working on some black and white designs of crop circles, had a couple printed and hanging up on the wall.

“Black and white? Really?” I thought. I had never seen a black and white Tarot deck. Then a clear image came – a black card with a white symbol; a pentagram interwoven with triangles like a Celtic knot. I recognised the image instantly; it was Jakob’s art logo, his own symbol of creation. It was perfect.

I pushed my chair back and stood up, quickly gathered my things and hurried out the door. His apartment was a short bike ride away and I couldn’t wait to tell him about my great idea.

Tarot in Black & White: A Path to Personal Transformation

For questions and tips about reading Tarot ~ Ask The Hoo

Tarot is old, really really old. As a spiritual system it is intimately connected to the ancient Tree of Life. It has roots in the Kabbalah and possibly the ancient mystery schools of Egypt and, like all good spiritual systems, it doesn’t preach but rather invites you to investigate, to decipher the metaphors and stories for yourself and to live the teachings until you discover your own truth.

I use Tarot as a mirror to reflect the self, to access inner knowing, develop intuition and reveal hidden insights. From the modern perspective, Tarot provides a map of the human psyche and a path of personal growth from innocence to maturity – something which can be sorely lacking in contemporary culture.

We begin our journey in life as the Fool, enthusiastically (if a bit naively) setting out to discover the world. On the way we meet challenges, experience soul lessons and encounter archetypal characters and initiations. If we apply ourselves sincerely to the tasks presented, we emerge transformed - reborn with a new wisdom and the tools to deal with whatever life brings us.

So the journey through the Tarot is a journey from Beginnings to Wholeness and when I decided to write my own tarot deck, it was this path of personal transformation that I wanted to share with others, including those that “aren’t really into tarot”.

In writing the Tarot in Black & White, I have focused on the qualities of the characters and what we can learn from them. The High Priestess for example, initiates us into the Sacred Feminine and shows us how to use our Intuition whilst the Hierophant teaches Knowledge; both self-knowledge and greater spiritual knowledge. The Wizard teaches us the power of Manifestation and the Hermit shares his love of Solitude…

I felt it was important to make the deck gender balanced, so I have used Prince and Princess cards to give these characters equal footing rather than the traditional Knight and the ‘Page’, who is really a kind of girly boy. Also my perspective is modern, so the traditional Devil card becomes Temptation, the Judgement card becomes Rebirth and the Hanged Man is expressed as Surrender.

One of the things that is difficult when learning Tarot is remembering the meanings of the cards and with crop circle designs this is doubly difficult! Therefore I have named the cards so that you have a quick reference to connect to. I find this especially helpful when choosing one card for the day, as it gives you a simple focus, one word to remember as you go about your daily activities.

The cards chosen, the book written, I sat down with Jakob to choose the crop circles. We researched a couple of hundred crop circles through the internet, finding exactly the right aerial photographs to give us the images we needed. We chose the crop circles together, intuitively, to marry with the meanings of the cards. It was easy, effortless. I have always felt that the test of a good creative process is in how well you follow the flow of energy. The Major Arcana fell together like lovers reunited, the Court Cards happily arranged themselves in harmonious families and lastly the Pip Cards lined up in organised rows. Both perfectionists at heart, neither of us was willing to settle for second best and when a few cards were left without a matching image, we searched further…

I personally believe that the crop circles have messages of their own; they are geometric designs and like all the structure in the world around us, they are patterns which contain information. Our DNA, cellular structure, the configuration of the planets, the frequency of sound waves are all interwoven patterns which communicate on different levels. The more you use the cards, the more they will speak to you and this adds another dimension entirely to the Tarot in Black & White

Jakob created each unique black and white image in fine detail, and we worked together to design the cards and layout of the book. Synchronicity was our best friend and all together the creation of the deck took us less than 6 months. We printed the first few copies at the local copy shop and we actually made the first few decks by hand, covering them in sticky contact paper and cutting out the cards. There’s nothing quite as satisfying as holding the very first deck of cards in your hands…I still have mine and I shuffle through them occasionally just to remember the very beginning...

For questions and tips about reading Tarot ~ Ask The Hoo