![]() ![]() I realized in the morning that I had been a ghost, and I had experienced what it meant to have a spirit but with no way of speaking, so that’s where the name Spirit Speak came from - I wanted to honor her, to give her a voice. It was heartbreaking - I had a home and loved ones, but I couldn’t reach them. In the dream, I was a woman living in the city with my husband and child, but whenever I would return home they would push me out, they didn’t want me to be there, and for some reason I could not communicate or speak to them. ![]() F lying ointment is a type of salve or oil that traditionally has slightly poisonous or psychotropic herbs in it - it’s said that witches who were being persecuted would rub this ointment on themselves and sit by the fire (this activates the herbs) and would meet in other realms to gather. The name Spirit Speak came from a dream I had in Mendocino, California after rubbing flying ointment on myself. I had a lot of open space and time to work on the deck and to embark on what I didn't know then, but what became a spiritual change within me. I started the creation of this project at the same time I had stopped drinking and going to shows. It wasn’t until after it was finished that I started contemplating reproduction. I didn’t think too much at first about publishing it, it was just for me. It was created as part of a group art show in Oakland and my objective with that body of work was to simplify the symbolism and make the cards easier to read and understand for myself. What was this first deck?! My first deck is the Spirit Speak Tarot. ![]() ![]() It wasn’t until many years later when I was living in Oakland, California that I started my first deck in 2014 as part of a group art show. I was utterly inspired by what they were doing - it made me feel free and it influenced me to think about making my own deck one day. I found out about The Collective Tarot around 2012, at a time when I was getting more serious about learning the cards. Decks that can shift the otherwise traditional and limiting depictions of this ancient symbolism are what I value most. Something that I find so important is looking at tarot as a radical act of self-reflection and -healing that falls outside the paradigm of western medicine and psychology. The Collective Tarot created and published deck that had a political focus and intentions of giving a queer, inclusive, and diverse lens on what we had previously known the tarot to be. In 2008, a deck called The Collective Tarot was published, and I see it as one of the most important decks in the development and progression of how we see tarot today: In most traditional decks we often find patriarchal values, heteronormative relationships, and a lack of racial diversity. I’ve been studying tarot for around seven years now, and for four of those years I’ve been creating my own decks. It wasn’t until I left home for Olympia, Washington that I brought the deck with me and started playing around with it. My family was Christian, so although I accepted the hand-me-down, I felt a little uncomfortable about having it in my possession at the time. I was gifted my first deck from my older brother around the age of 12 -but h e didn’t practice tarot, so I’m not sure why he had it. I don’t remember it feeling like a mystical awakening or a message from the Universe - I was just experimenting at first, I was curious. How were you first called to Tarot? I’m not sure if I was “called” to tarot. For this week’s Tarot Talk, we had the honor of speaking with Mary Evans - the creator of an insanely impressive five (yes, five ) different tarot and oracle decks since 2014 (with a sixth one on the way!) -on finding herself through divination, expanding her art into clothing, and re-evaluating her crystal collection. ![]()
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