HP Tarot thumbnails - The Hermit
Wow, the internet will tell you everything.
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"Trivial hurts, tiny human accidents. These are of no more significance than the scurryings of ants to the wide universe, and are unaffected by planetary movements." - Firenze
"They're deep, mind, centaurs... they know things... jus' don' let on much." - Rubeus Hagrid
The Hermit withdraws into solitude in order to seek wisdom and insight. I found the centaurs of the Forbidden Forest to best represent this, but in particular the centaur Firenze, who seeks to impart his wisdom on humans instead of treating them with disdain or hostility.
Notable art bits:
1. Wow, I was under the completely wrong impression of what palominos are. I guess I had it inverted with roan.
2. The traditional Hermit carries a lantern to light the path to enlightenment. This is replaced by the sage & mallowsweet Firenze is toking up burning for capnomancy. Centaurs are tall, and it seems kind of inconvenient to burn stuff on the ground even if they're sitting down (Think about how big a horse is when it lies down. Then add a whole human torso on top of that.) so I gave him a stone bowl which is pretty cool and kind of pagan-y. I hope.
3. The six-pointed star in the lantern is the Seal of Solomon which represents insight and balance. This is referenced by Mars (the reddish star) which is bright tonight.
4. Nobody will ever notice this but Mars is in Scorpio. The Hermit is associated with Virgo, and I thought about putting that in the sky, but well... Scorpius just naggingly felt more right to me for some reason. Upon a trip to Wikipedia, I found out that Scorpio is astrologically ruled by Mars, which really helps with the war-like augury, AND it's also ruled by Pluto, which is of course death. Plus of course it also doesn't hurt that it's a giant poisonous scorpion that stung Orion to death. As a matter of fact, The Tower and Death are the cards associated with Mars and Scorpio, so quite apt that the stars would be warning of that. Furthermore, I like the juxtaposition of Mars close to Antares ("anti/counter-Mars") which is the heart of the scorpion and therefore ITS BLOOD. It's also memorable to me because I was in Australia in summer of 2001 when Mars was at its closest (and thus brightest) opposition point to the Earth in its orbit, and got to see just that conjunction of Mars and Scorpius when we were out on a crocodile farm at night and able to see the clearest starry sky ever because of depleted ozone layer no light pollution. (summercomfort, remember that?)
> (Hey, I used to be an astronomy buff because of Sailor Moon, okay?)
5. By the way, I'm not trying to make The Hermit look like an ominous card or anything, so hopefully all that crazy crap will just be an unnoticed background easter egg book reference thing.
6. Alternate pose study for man+horse:
Finally, a chance to bust out my muscular anatomy skills outside of impractically idealized sculptures XD I'm not sure whether I'll go with this one or the one in the thumbnail above - my brain says #2 is a more readable (and natural) pose, but for whatever reason I feel like #1 has more dimension and interest (once I fix the awkwardness). Anyone have a preference or suggestion?
I wonder if centaurs ever use their own butts backs for a table. I think I would.
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"Trivial hurts, tiny human accidents. These are of no more significance than the scurryings of ants to the wide universe, and are unaffected by planetary movements." - Firenze
"They're deep, mind, centaurs... they know things... jus' don' let on much." - Rubeus Hagrid
The Hermit withdraws into solitude in order to seek wisdom and insight. I found the centaurs of the Forbidden Forest to best represent this, but in particular the centaur Firenze, who seeks to impart his wisdom on humans instead of treating them with disdain or hostility.
Notable art bits:
1. Wow, I was under the completely wrong impression of what palominos are. I guess I had it inverted with roan.
2. The traditional Hermit carries a lantern to light the path to enlightenment. This is replaced by the sage & mallowsweet Firenze is toking up burning for capnomancy. Centaurs are tall, and it seems kind of inconvenient to burn stuff on the ground even if they're sitting down (Think about how big a horse is when it lies down. Then add a whole human torso on top of that.) so I gave him a stone bowl which is pretty cool and kind of pagan-y. I hope.
3. The six-pointed star in the lantern is the Seal of Solomon which represents insight and balance. This is referenced by Mars (the reddish star) which is bright tonight.
4. Nobody will ever notice this but Mars is in Scorpio. The Hermit is associated with Virgo, and I thought about putting that in the sky, but well... Scorpius just naggingly felt more right to me for some reason. Upon a trip to Wikipedia, I found out that Scorpio is astrologically ruled by Mars, which really helps with the war-like augury, AND it's also ruled by Pluto, which is of course death. Plus of course it also doesn't hurt that it's a giant poisonous scorpion that stung Orion to death. As a matter of fact, The Tower and Death are the cards associated with Mars and Scorpio, so quite apt that the stars would be warning of that. Furthermore, I like the juxtaposition of Mars close to Antares ("anti/counter-Mars") which is the heart of the scorpion and therefore ITS BLOOD. It's also memorable to me because I was in Australia in summer of 2001 when Mars was at its closest (and thus brightest) opposition point to the Earth in its orbit, and got to see just that conjunction of Mars and Scorpius when we were out on a crocodile farm at night and able to see the clearest starry sky ever because of depleted ozone layer no light pollution. (summercomfort, remember that?)
> (Hey, I used to be an astronomy buff because of Sailor Moon, okay?)
5. By the way, I'm not trying to make The Hermit look like an ominous card or anything, so hopefully all that crazy crap will just be an unnoticed background easter egg book reference thing.
6. Alternate pose study for man+horse:
Finally, a chance to bust out my muscular anatomy skills outside of impractically idealized sculptures XD I'm not sure whether I'll go with this one or the one in the thumbnail above - my brain says #2 is a more readable (and natural) pose, but for whatever reason I feel like #1 has more dimension and interest (once I fix the awkwardness). Anyone have a preference or suggestion?
I wonder if centaurs ever use their own butts backs for a table. I think I would.