Carmen Sorrenti: Art from Dreams, Visions, and the Self
Carmen Sorrenti, creator
of the Pholarchos Tarot
|
GS: Your tarot paintings arrest me. I’m
drawn into a realm I’ve never seen before. In each picture, the central
character and all the vivid, almost burning color leaping from the canvas, stuns
me in an awakening way. I have to stare. There’s so much to see and wonder at. Things
are going on as if in a magical, fantastical forest—birds, tiny figures, and
all kinds of symbols for emotions, everything poised or moving with life. And
it’s all of these elements at once, like a mystical concoction, that pull me into
their strange and powerful world. Could you describe how you—your own essence—and
your later studies in dreams, mythologies, astrology, storytelling, and the human
experience alchemize in your creativity?
CS: I come from mountains that plunge into the sea. The elements are
forceful here and the area is dear to old myths. In some versions, it is where
Odysseus had himself tied to his ship’s mast to resist the onslaught of siren
song. Greek colonies settled along the Amalfi Coast and not far south was a
place called Velia, where the philosopher Parmenides lived in the 5th century
BC. He is believed to be one of the mysterious “Pholarchos.” I like how the
author of ancient philosophy, Peter Kingsley, describes the “idea” of
Pholarchos—literally “Lord of the Lair”—as one who enters a cave and waits for
big dreams that can be taken back to the community. This practice developed
into the healing dream temples dedicated to Asclepius (god of medicine) and the
snakes.
I
didn't know that Parmenides had lived so near my home, nor did I know about
his devotions, until the summer I was in the Dodecanese. These islands float
just off Turkey and look onto what used to be Caria. This is a land dense with
the original Pholarchos caves. Again, I didn't know this at the time, but on
the first night there I had a riveting dream involving the divinities of that
very region. I had Kingsley’s book with me and soon brought all these stories
together.
Much
later, neuroanthropologist Charles Laughlin’s book Communing with the Gods confirmed what was forming in my mind—that
since we have lived and breathed upon this earth, in every part of her great
rich body, we've sought out caves for ritual dreaming. Pholarchos babies are in
every era and culture; dreaming is a primal, necessary practice. And today, our
beds are secret healing temples . . . we have no idea how much our dreams do
for us each night.
Laughlin
raises another point in his book. He says in: “A society’s cosmology and
symbolic system are ultimately the product of the creative imagination of its
people. I'm not talking about imagination in the mundane fantasy sense (i.e.,
imagined unreality) but rather the Imaginatio in Henry Corbin’s sense—the
exercise of the creative intuitive faculties associated with imagery by which
the essentially invisible aspects of reality become envisioned.”
GS: That quote speaks to your images
and imagery in the deck.
CS: Yes—the mythic imagination is expansive, able to hold contradiction,
mystery, metamorphosis. The imaginal is real and needs tending—it is our
relation to it that can be more or less fantastical. Humans have always looked
to myth, dream, theater, and story to find a sense of meaning and guidance.
Prediction can be diminutive while story opens understanding and possibility, a
way of working with one’s destiny and patterns. Astrologer and author Liz Greene
reflects that “like all symbolic systems, tarot is about patterns rather than
events.” My cards are an attempt to open inspiration, a possible experience of
an archetype that invites personal investigation into life’s depths.
GS: I’m glad you said that because the
paintings do open the viewer’s latent visionary depths, and even the
weirdnesses in the images—the flitting spectrum of human good and naughty— feel
like true life forces. I find the texts that accompany the cards convey the
same living, almost intangible ideas as your visionary artwork. At the same
time, the flowing words convey positivism and encouragement to open ourselves
to the infinite well of human creativity and insight within us.
CS: Yes, passion is always under your skin. It’s what animates everything.
At crucial moments in your life, the dragon rises its head fully and you find
yourself at a power juncture that unfolds design. In such moments synchronicity
is at a peak, the imaginal is sharp, all conspires to get you to pay attention.
Sometimes it seems too much to bear, especially if you stuff it into an alembic
and wait for transformation. Alchemical language is scattered through the
cards, as is its fundamental sense of timing signaled but not dictated by the
planets measuring the sky. This is a world of correspondences, and how could
the soul not be part of this communal language? Within this, according to
passion and inclination, alchemists have always taken the freedom to experiment
with their art when seeking to make gold or an authentic self—also known as the
diamond body, the lapis, and the philosopher’s stone—the soul’s hunger as it
creates its fundamental core.
GS: How long did the tarot deck take to
dream, study, and complete, and could you share a bit your experience?
CS: I devoted four years to painting, writing, and
dreaming the deck. In 2013, I spent a lot of time in the ruins of an Asclepeion
in Rome. These
were temples scattered all over the ancient world where people with
illnesses would sleep and wait for a dream that held a cure for their ailment. Certain
images and sensations began to constellate around what practices might have
taken place there two thousand years ago. Then other experiences took me even
further back to the people (possibly called Pholarchos) who used caves to call
on prophetic and healing dreams for the community.
Today we tend to dismiss our
dreaming, yet it’s an integral part of our being alive in a body on this
planet. As a society, we’ve lost contact with a fundamental language. In all, the
deck has seventy-eight images with accompanying texts—unlike traditional cards,
the texts do not explain the cards (there are plenty of wonderful books that do
this), but instead use dreams as stories to engender felt sense—as with
dreaming, the first impact is experiential and emotional. I’m hoping this will
encourage people to continue exploring their own personal archetypes, through
their own engagement with dreaming and the imaginal—like becoming the card for
a moment and dreaming it on— stories make sense of our lives and help us discover
what is inside us. They are myths, and as dream expert Jeremy Taylor has said: myths
are collective dreams. Alchemical and astrological language is also woven into the
deck to create a kind of map with which to navigate so much rich material.
The Deck Travels in 2018
Carmen Sorrenti's Pholarchos Tarot deck (published by Arnell Ando) debuts in spring 2018 and then tours New York, Boston, and Chicago from September to December 2018. The exhibition includes performance art that brings the deck's characters to life. Check the website for updates on the deck's exhibitions and related programming and workshops: www.carmensorrenti.com.
Hierophant
Before
the temple, mosque, synagogue, church, the caves were homes to sacred ritual, a
lair of wonder. This creature keeps track of our religious languages. Through
her body the phoenix is reborn again and again. Made of chlorophyll and
philosophy, she balances all potential on a spiral of manifestation, hears the
red and the white snakes as they mingle in the space of her understanding.
Preside over the mysteries so they may make a map for you.
Lovers
Venus
drops her precious stones in your blood stream and Vulcan nimbly makes jewels
of them. You plunge and surge onto a shore of deep belonging. Now you are vast,
the waters of love dissolve your mold yet passion is always glistening inside
you, setting a course for life, not only now. Within the fiery dragon of the
heart is the lookout point. Keep the taste on your tongue and rather than burn
right through, seek an underlying design. This is you unfolding.
Strength
Inside
your belly. The lion’s hunger insatiable, its eyes yellow alarm, claws
ready-made scythes. It will not hesitate to rip right through you and make a
mockery of your life in order to find food. It will have you unless you turn
and look into those eyes, offer of yourself. Exchange on its own terms. Then it
will, like the cards of old, open its mouth for you and let you take what you
need when you need it. Your resolve and your fortitude must shine forth. Do not
think you can bypass the wild center—it generates your will to live. Etch its
mane somewhere along the castle walls, feed it the flesh of your devotion,
practice touching your molten core.
Hanged
One
An
archaic lineage comes calling. It is your turn to allow control to flood away,
not knowing who you will be when it returns. The great river rushes through
you. You are not alone in this surrender and everything moves in surprising
ways. Ancient memory may return that you have been this way before, at another
turning of your soul’s necessity. Paulina risked being burned at the stake for
bringing the queen back to life. She waited sixteen years for it to be the
right moment. And her only words to the expectant and condemning crowd were:
“It is required you do awake your faith”. And so the tale of winter becomes the
tale of hope.
Star
When
the water turns black, follow the sage’s climb into the mountain as she mumbles
amritas from the dreaming. Slip into the cave where the source is. Red striated
rock surrounds you now, miniature bursts of chemical process coax more of its
true nature into being. The sage laughs into the deep cold pool until the water
turns crystal clear again, gurgling regeneration. Allow laughter to enter you
and to this tune, make a scarf with woven leaves of angelica, charge it up with
song then wear it. It whispers back to you as you keep walking, ambrosia round
your neck. Your love makes numen.
Moon
She
may open a vein of longing to last for generations or take you back further
than the usual couple thousand years, a bridge to a much older time. You feel
it in the dreaming, all those voices. We’re in that boat again. A man demonstrates an elemental feat, makes
striking sounds instead of words, becomes the night. Mesmerised, you ride the swell of magnified
feeling, Dionysian, electric. Our captain docks with her eyes closed as she
considers those teachers that work with the Other side. She senses land mass
changes through the ages, sees that piece of curve and strait while deep within
she hears: the sea the sea the sea. How many turnings of pattern and labyrinth
can you float in at once?
Sun
Take
your song to Apollo for he is the essence of the light. This is how the story
goes…he was born on Delos, an island aptly named the ‘unconcealed one’. It
used to be a barren perch with no name and no fixed placement, a wanderer in
the stormy, windy waves—till the birth. In the inner heart lies the gold and we
have learned to conceal it. Make Delos. Here’s a quest encouraging you to find
the hidden elixir, the unconcealed one. It
surges you upwards into the elated world, now bright with substance. Give
yourself to the inner marriage. Whatever
you do in this life, find your essence and be true to it.
Dreamer
of sparks
A
small whirlwind starts at ground level, sweeping round the furniture. The black
trash bags in the corner have opened and the two once lifeless puppets are
peeking into the room. As old fear shudders away she pulls them out and places
them on chairs. She discovers she is fond of them and trails her hand through
tufts of hair. Their beauty is growing at every touch. As she caresses boy
puppet’s neck the pair open their eyes simultaneously and they smile. The light
changes as they are bathed in new vision.
Climb to where the
air is spirited and your clothes feel light. Bring them every love letter for
discernment. They stare unashamedly into your eyes, a great fluttering of birds
of all sizes, in perfect balance between species. Don’t mind if they seem impudent,
this is how they strip you to your truth, don’t mind the pain. The path is full
of scattered poems brought in by wind storms. You may feel like your skin is
being read aloud and every one of your thoughts caught on the current.
Artist’s Bio
Carmen Sorrenti was born in
Positano, Italy, where she grew up tended to by an Ozzie hippie mom and a host
of international artists and eccentrics. Her early food consisted of mystical Persian
poetry, Hungarian cartoon strips, singing drag acts and travel…. After training
at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, she
toured with theater companies, worked at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, played in
Martin Scorsese’s Gangs of New York
and opposite John Turturro in Secret
Passage. Her favorite experience on stage was playing Philomele in
Wertenbaker’s The Love of the Nightingale
for Theatre Melange...such encounters with Greek tragedy developed her
interest in mythology, which she further investigated with studies at Liz
Greene’s Centre
of Psychological Astrology.
Her expanding research needed a more personal outlet as this weave engendered a
stronger and stronger visionary dream life, so she unearthed her childhood
passion for paint and poetry. She spent years compulsively experimenting in a
kind of alchemical laboratory, putting Shakespeare on canvas rather than on
stage. In the autumn of 2012 she began having a
series of dreams about plants—this lasted a whole year and restructured her
worldview.
Sorrenti has contributed to various
publications and painted book jackets. Her deck’s Moon card (shown above) won the Premio Giorgione
for Alchemical Painting. She has recently been selected as a Top Ten Artist for
art511mag.
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