Welcome To Merkstave
The word ‘Merkstave’ comes from old Norse or the Germanic peoples – it means ‘dark stick.’
Why did I choose this word to describe my Tarot art?
This word is used in regard to the runes when they don’t land upright. It is the reverse meaning or the ‘dark’ meaning (end of the stick).
My Tarot art, that you are about to voyage through, is Merkstave in both senses.
Before starting these images I had been studying the art of Tarot symbolism. I had also been looking at my own belief systems.
It had been repetitively, unrelentingly, inescapably made blatantly obvious to me that I had to sort my shit out!
Stop ignoring and start dealing with my Shadow.
The Shadow Self is something that originates (in a psychological sense) with Carl Jung, talking about the darker aspects of your psyche. The part of you that you would rather not look at.
The problem is, if you don’t acknowledge something, it can still have an effect on you.
The time had come to start the fantastic process of self analysis.
I’m sure any of you would agree spending hours in front of a mirror picking out all of your character flaws is the best evening you could hope for!
Yeah… I wasn’t that keen either, so how was I going to do this?
As mentioned before in other posts, I drew inspiration from Molly Roberts http://mollyrobertsmagick.blogspot.co.nz/ to start an art scrap book that collected my thoughts and research in a
visually stimulating way. She had a video where she was showing you some things and she was talking about using the tarot to hone in on issues one wanted to deal with. She would take the card, place it in a sacred space in reverse and every time she focused on the card it would remind her of the issue. I thought this was a cool idea! Thanks Molly 😉
However when I tried this I couldn’t focus on an upside down image, it just wasn’t stimulating enough.
While this was happening, I was also looking into making colouring pages and the idea of having them be for meditative use.
This is a subject that held a special connection to me from my childhood experiences in hospital.
1+1=2, the two things collided and Merkstave was born.
I would draw the reversal of the cards, and when I had an issue crop up or that I needed to focus on, I could have an image that was a true representation of it.
This would allow me to concentrate on the issue while colouring it (meditation isn’t exactly a strong point of mine either). Hopefully this process would help me begin to deal with this issue.
Another way to use it would be to colour the parts that are relevant to your issue and leave the rest for when it’s relevant.
So yes, originally these images were going to be just for me.
A strange thing started happening though. As I started to draw them, the meaning began to manifest itself in reality. You could say that because I was aware of the issues within the card, that I now noticed them in real life. I would agree, yes. When you are studying about misogyny or internalised misogyny, you are certain to find examples within your everyday life. However, how odd is it that when I drew The High Priestess Reversed the ‘meninists’ try to gatecrash a Wonder Woman movie, starting an internet blitz of hate speech about women from both sexes. Or an acquaintance just happens to have a client sexually harass her, causing an ugly battle within her company resulting, ultimately, in her resignation. Not convinced?
How about when I started The Empress Reversed, I became artistically blocked for months and when I snapped out of it, life threw every spanner at me to stop any creativity from being conceivable. To the extreme of my partner going through an ectopic pregnancy. I wanted to put my head in the sand… but then I’d be going backwards and nothing would get done.
What is great though is that they worked. Once an image was complete, I felt like a new version of myself. Just like the prisoner who has walked out of the cave of shackled darkness, remembering what grass is like while experiencing it.
I didn’t however want these images to be drawn and not used, hence my decision to share them with you.
So again why Merkstave and not simply Tarot Reversed?
Most people will not voluntarily look at the darker aspect of the Tarot. You will always hear people say “Oh I don’t use reversals, they are not relevant, or will upset others. I only want to look at positives.’
This is not, however, the people that read both into the one card. A lot of people don’t see the need, because if they use cards for divinitory purposes the reading will dictate whether it is negative or positive.
That’s cool, I get that.
These images are not for that, these images are personal. They are to highlight, focus on an issue and hopefully help resolve it.
So with this in mind, I prefer Merkstave as these images are not just the reverse or negative, they are the darker aspect of the same image. Just as it is the darker aspect of your own psyche.
I hope you take courage and dive into this exploration of the self, I can totally recommend it, not just because of the images but because of the impact it has had on me.
