MOTHERPEACE TAROT

I personally read the Motherpeace Tarot for my clients. I met this wonderful deck over thirty years ago in America. One of the keys to interpreting a deck lies in who created it? Tarot artists are really different to Tarot readers. So researching and knowing who your artists are is important. It is their interpretation of the Tarot structure and its archetypes that will trigger your knowledge . 

The Motherpeace was created by two women, Vicki Noble and Karen Vogel and was a historic deck as it was the first deck to portray the positive feminine in both its shape as a circular deck and the empowered images of the feminine it uses. These women were trail blazers in the time of realising womens' power  and the need for women to reclaim their power and heal. This is why I love this deck, which I have travelled all around the world with; my Motherpeace is always packed and is the possession I fear losing the most. 

The images in this deck are designed to heal people and even though they contain very raw realities people can always gaze and pick up the Motherpeace and look deeply into it and realise the pain but what these fabulous artists stripped back was the need for fear in approaching the Tarot. We all have enough of our own fear we don't need to be presented by frightening images to make us feel our fear.  

The actual text book which accompanied the original deck was a masterpiece in its self. The  knowledge of women's mysteries and business was a pioneering work to break down the barriers of a patriarchy that not only Tarot engendered but so too society. The subtitle is A Way to the Goddess through Myth, Art and Tarot and it begins with Starhawk's "charge to the Star Goddess" Every day I read this deck; I open with this charge to the Goddess. Every reader develops her own ritual and way to approach the Tarot and this poem is my prayer. Reading this text not only enhanced my knowledge of the cards but filled me in on feminine herstory and is still a text I enjoy today.  Noble takes us back to times pre patriarchy and highlights the feminine spirituality which predates it.The Motherpeace is not a traditional Tarot. Its a feminine tarot so its structures do differ from the tradition.

So What's Different in the Motherpeace?

In the Major Arcana the Emperor and the Heirophant represent the harshness of the patriarchy that has weighed us all down. These two images challenge the male domination in the business, material and religious domains. This deck or the era of this deck (1983) marked the transition of the Heirophant through to this modern day. It is the card most often altered in modern decks. The stiff rigidity of the papacy is moving in time. The concept of the round shape opened up a whole new way of viewing time. The Wheel of Fortune card is an astrology wheel and however it falls on the cloth is the appropriate rising sign energy we are using in the reading. The dark night of the soul cards became approachable Death marked letting go, The Devil moved to denying our spirit, and Judgement became about healing the Earth. This Major Arcana allowed us in to work with our processes and our evolving cultures.

The Minor Arcana are depicted as the "Dramas of Everyday Life" 

I love this concept as although very important in any reading the Minors will move quickly. If we have a reading full of tens, then by the end of the reading we want Aces. This is indicating the moving processes of life. The Minors have four pathways we can be on ; an emotional pathway for Cups, practical and pragmatic with Discs in the Motherpeace, traditionally pentacles. The Swords are air in this deck, so a mental path and the Wands are fire representing movement, action and vision. If we follow the Motherpeace suits we see the our everyday world depicted in front of us. These are cards of process. They help us take the steps we need to create our own life paths.

Motherpeace
@US Games

Motherpeace@
U.S.Games

The Court Cards even up the gender with Pages being Daughters, this is the trend of modern decks to bring the feminine to the Page; Sons replace Knights, Priestesses replace Queens and Shamans replace Kings. Noble and Vogel believed women were oppressed by sexuality and religious beliefs and this deck redresses these concepts by celebrating the sexuality and spirituality  of women. 

The Court is a spiritual process in the Motherpeace.

Motherpeace
@U.S. Games

 As you can see from my images, my deck is well worn.  I have read it for you for over thirty years. It is the deck that speaks to every person that enters my reading space. No one fears it; it gets picked up and looked into and single images go with you after the reading to infiltrate what consciousness you need.

I thank Vicki Noble and Karen Vogel for creating my best friend.

Of interest.

There are quite a few texts written by both Vicki Noble  and Karen Vogel to accompany the Motherpeace.  

Motherpeace Tarot Guidebook is a pocket size book that interprets the cards and is kept in my drawer.

Motherpeace Tarot Playbook which is full of ideas to learn more about the deck.

Rituals and Practices with the Motherpeace Tarot.

Fashion store Dior have used Motherpeace Images on balloons in windows.