Justice
A lot of people shy away from the Death card in Tarot, using different labels, or not naming the card at all.
Artist and poet Ricardo Olvera has taken a completely different perspective, and has used death as a main feature throughout his deck.
He’s created The Bone Tarot, an art exhibit made up of twenty-two pieces, each work an assemblage of animal bones and found objects, and based on one of the Major Arcana.
Olvera sees the show as a ‘symbolic mandala’, each piece important on its own, but even more meaningful as part of a grander whole.
He uses the bones to highlight the tension between life and death, and to show that one cannot be without the other.
Olvera’s sculptural deck is not meant for divination, though he says it can be used that way too. He sees it more as an homage, his interest being strictly aesthetic.
But as with divination, appreciating visual art involves looking and interpreting. As one explores a piece, or a card, the process of interpretation itself invokes insight.
The show opens tomorrow and runs through July 30th at Sheppard Fine Arts Gallery in Reno, Nevada at the University of Nevada.
Olvera will give a lecture about his work at the opening reception, Wednesday, July 13th.
If you’re in the area, take a look.
