From Touchstone TarotTM by Kat Black
Eight of Wands
Meanings
Take flight. Swift action brings results. A flurry of creative activity, a burst of highly productive energy. Important information arriving quickly. Travel by air.
Reversed (?)
Hasty words are soon regretted. Perhaps you should think twice before sending that email?
Description
A young woman sits on a balcony overlooking a lush rural landscape. She looks up at eight sprouting wands flying through the air. The woman wears a large turban decorated with gold embellishments and a red silk wrap. She is holding a scroll of music.
The portrait is the Cumaean Sibyl, although in name alone. She looks remarkably similar to a number of other paintings by Domenichino. Once he got something right, he repeated it: this baby-faced musician appears as St Cecilia and even St John the Evangelist in other paintings of his, right down to the folds in the wrap and the position of the hands on the scroll. Before photography, who would have known he kept repainting the same picture again and again with a new title each time? That's got nothing to do with the meaning of this card, but I thought it might be an interesting little factoid for the art history buffs!
Artwork
- Wand: TIZIANO, Vecellio (Titian), St Christopher, 1524, Palazzo Ducale, Venice.
- Wand leaves: PONTORMO, Jacopo, Cosimo il Vecchio, c.1520, Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.
- Landscape, sky: BRIL, Paul, An Extensive Landscape, 1600s, private collection.
- Girl: DOMENICHINO, The Cumaean Sibyl, c. 1610, Pinacoteca Capitolina, Rome.
And we historians do appreciate the factoid, Kat! Thanks!