The Root of the Soul
Daily Draw July 16th, 2009
Time for the Via Tarot and a random roll through Symbolist Art by Edward Lucie-Smith.
The relevant Symbolist quote:
“If we look through Redon’s work with this particular preoccupation in mind, we can discover most of the standard Symbolist properties – masks, snaky monsters, severed heads, femme fatales, new interpretations of Classical mythology. But what matters is the very personal way in which they are interpreted. Redon claimed that he was constantly being surprised by his own art, while Maurice Denis, who admired his work greatly, declared ‘the lesson of Redon is his powerlessness to paint anything which is not representative of a state of soul, which does not express some depth of emotion, which does not translate an interior vision’. Of all the masters of Symbolist art, he is the most consistently convincing.”
ACE OF DISKS – THE ROOT OF THE POWERS OF EARTH
This card also specifically mentions “soul,” and a united mind and body with no conflict between inner and outer selves. Wealth, riches in the material world, abundance, all these wrap into a contentment with the energy of the Ace, the purest condition.
Perhaps as a man, who in societal expectation was supposed to rein in emotion, Redon was surprised when he saw the depth of emotion he was capable of expressing in his art? After all, it’s really not done is it? We can’t be having men expressing emotion in our society or terrible consequences will occur. How awful the civilization that expects one gender to be less than human, to have less soul.
How kind is Art to let a man express his soul when the society he lives in condemns such a thing. Rooted to the Earth, he has no need of conflict between the inner and outer self, but can achieve the purest condition of the Ace of Disks through art and the representation of the soul.
Two illustrations on the facing pages in the book are Redon’s The Sun Chariot of Apollo with Four Horses and the whispering miasma in the coils of The Green Death. Apollo harnessed his emotion and power and brought light and music to the world in his interior vision. The Green Death is somewhat indefinable as many of Redon’s artworks are. Maybe the thought of Death made him feel greenly sick or perhaps the figure is from a dream rising from the chasm of his soul? What strikes me most about his work is that he didn’t get hung up about photo-realism or capturing things exactly as is fashionable today, nor did he dither about at great expense taking a masterclass from the chi-chi artist of the moment. The minutiae of detail didn’t bog him down, he painted what he felt, what was going through his mind, his Self.
I think The Root of the Powers of the Earth would want that sort of action. How refreshing it is in a sea of sameness to see this purest of conditions held up: the power to be your Self, to be rooted. The image on the card looks as if she held the rose up, and it was so light and pure that it started to float out of her hands, like a soul flying.
Tags: Ace of Disks, Odilon Redon, soul, Symbolist Art, The Green Death, The Sun Chariot of Apollo with Four Horses, Via Tarot
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