Desert Oracle

I have returned from the San Francisco Bay Area Tarot Symposium (BATS), and it was excellent! According to its producer, Thalassa Queen of BATS, this year’s Symposium was the biggest and best yet. Ninety-odd people attended, including Solandia, owner of the Aeclectic Tarot Forum, all the way from Australia!

Two full days of Tarot lectures and workshops, socializing, and shopping filled our schedule. On Saturday, I attended the following presentations:

• The Lovers Weave Spread (Joseph Ernest Martin, the Quest Tarot) – a fun relationship spread incorporating Tarot origami (no cards were injured in this spread)

• Natural Divination: The Way of the Tarot of the Nine Paths (Dr. Art Rosengarten, Tarot and Psychology) – Art introduced us to his new Majors –only deck, the Tarot of the Nine Paths, explained his rationale of adding 5 new Majors, and talked about reading from a nondual perspective.

• The Hanged Man: Traitor or Hero? (Rachel Pollack) – an exploration of different perspectives on the Hanged Man, its various meanings and lessons.

• Rider Waite Smith Kissing Cousins (Holly Voley) – a look at various Rider Waite “clones” and the alarming trend (to Holly) of new deck creators to simply copy the imagery of the RWS deck as if it were the ultimate Tarot authority

• An Exploration of W. B. Yeats’ Poems of the Tarot (Carole Pierce) – College Lit 201 deconstruction of some of Yeats’ poetry and its Tarot imagery

The “BATS in the Belfry” cocktail party brought Saturday to a close. Along with socializing, attendees were treated to a guest appearance by “A. E. Waite” and “Pixie Smith”, who mingled with the guests. A nice piece of theatre!

Sunday was the more ‘academic’ part of BATS – the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the RWS deck and the work of Pamela Colman Smith.  The presentations were:

• 100 Years of the RWS Deck and Its Descendants (Holly Voley) – Holly led us through the publication history of the RWS deck and its variations, Pam A, B, C & D decks, as well as the various editions of Waite’s (Pictorial) Key to the Tarot. Holly brought her collection of historical decks (I got to hold a 1909 RWS Pam A deck!) and some pieces of Pamela Colman Smith’s artwork.

• Waite and the Secret Tradition (Mary Greer) – Mary discussed some of the themes & stories that Waite felt expressed an underlying truth behind the Symbolism of the Major & Minor Arcana

• Female Knights & Feminist Desire: Coding in Pamela Colman Smith’s Tarot (Melinda Parsons) – Melinda examined selected cards for likely coded meanings related to PCS’ feminism. Her slide show allowed us to see how PCS might have painted portraits of her friends and contemporaries into some of the cards. For example, it could be argued that the famous actress Ellen Terry appears as the Queen of Wands. An absolutely fascinating presentation

• Panel Discussion on the RWS Tarot (Cynthia Giles, Rachel Pollack. Mary Greer, Melinda Parsons & Holly Voley) – The panelists shared some personal memories of their first experiences with the RWS deck, and answered audience questions about the deck’s artwork, history, and publication.

(L to R) C. Giles, R. Pollack, M. Greer, M. Parsons, H. Voley

This was my third time attending BATS, and it was a great symposium! So much to learn, so many people to meet, so much shopping to do, made this a very memorable weekend. I snagged a few choice items from some of the vendors, yet only bought one deck (Rosengarten’s Tarot of the Nine Paths)!

2009 was a banner year for me as far as Tarot events go. I helped to found the Albuquerque Tarot Meetup group, and was lucky enough to attend both the Readers Studio in NYC and BATS in San Francisco! I am still energized and anxious to share some of the weekend with the Meetup group and our local Tarot Circle. I hope to be able to attend both events again next year.