Artwork Description
Swoon – Oracle Deck: Paper Doll-Meaning from Experience
Dimensions: 17 x 11″
Year: 2024
Medium: archival digital print on Moab Entrada 300 gsm
Edition: ed. 1/20
The Mermaid paper doll asks you to use creativity to process something unresolved. Have you ever heard the saying that the opposite of depression isn’t happiness, but expression? And have you ever noticed how running a too-big-to-hold experience through a creative medium somehow changes it, and you, at a cellular level? What felt terrifying and incomprehensible comes back dressed in familiarity and meaning, and it may even have a lost sense of agency by its side.
So what is that thing sitting heavy on your heart that might be lightened by giving it a voice? When Caelum and Terra escaped the watery Toad Well, Caelum created an allegory of the experience through a set of paper dolls of her and Terra as mermaids in a mysterious lagoon swimming up to safety. Retelling that terrifying moment with the assistance of her favorite archetypes was precisely the balm she needed.
Some even say the entire Sibylant Sisters tale is just such an allegory. So whatever your favorite form of expression, now is the time to let it be there for you. Make something that the world doesn’t even need to see. A conversation between you and you, with the muses as a wind at your back. Cause if you’ve drawn the Paper Doll card, chances are, creative expression is gonna be a big ally in the very near future.