THE DEVIL
THE LIVING TAROT
Artistic Director
Cheryl Flaharty
Dancer
Justin Young
Production Assistant
Brian Gustaveson
Creative Assistant
Dack Quigley
Costume and Set Design
Cheryl Flaharty
Lighting
Janine Myers
Video Editing
Neal Izumi
Creative Team
Rey Lopez, Karen Kiefer, Mo, Dee Laris, Carlyn Wolfe, Mike Pryor, Amanda Sims, April Mae Bartelme, Rose Wolfe, Ginger Royal, Trish Brubaker, Chris Barreto, Aaron Lowe, The Dancers.
Supported by the Hawai`i State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, through appropriations from the Legislature of the State of Hawai`i or grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Cades Foundation, and Jean Rolles.
Photos: Darren Miller, Bryan Gustaveson, Mike Pryor, and Sergio Goes.
ABOUT THE TAROT
One of the most ancient studies of enlightenment and discovery of the authentic "Self”, Tarot images– linked to ancient beliefs, mythologies, and religious systems– form the seeds of fundamental psychological and spiritual experiences. Often associated with magic and the occult, the deck is the precursor to our well known playing cards.
ABOUT THE SHOW
Originally created and performed in 2007, ‘The Living Tarot’ was the fourth interactive production of IONA’s diverse Salon Series which offered audiences a once in a lifetime provocative interpretation of eleven of the Major Arcana Tarot cards. The show took place in a century-old house located on Oahu's Pali Highway (dubbed, 'The House of the Living Tarot'), in which the living installations became personal encounters as audience-members roamed from room to room to experience the cards they were dealt as they walked in the door. The audience experienced each of the 5-minute tarot card performances in their own unique order. The dancers performed their pieces ten times each evening - a total of 60 times through the run of the show.
ABOUT THE DEVIL
The 15th Major Arcana Card, The Devil, is an archetypical figure whose lineage reaches back to antiquity, where he appeared as a beastly demon. It was not until Satan appeared in our Judeo-Christian culture that he began to assume more human characteristics and conduct his nefarious activities in ways we humans could more readily understand.
That the Devil’s image has become more humanized in the course of centuries means, symbolically, that we are more ready now to view him as a shadow aspect of ourselves rather than as a supernatural god or an infernal demon.
Satan’s wings, often pictured as bat wings, are particularly important. The bat is a night flyer, and the Devil too flies at night - a time when the rational mind is asleep. It is at this time that human beings lie unconscious, unprotected, and open to suggestion.
He tempts us to disobedience, urging us to taste the forbidden fruit and swallow the bittersweet morsel of good and evil. And now, having tasted, we are faced forevermore with the responsibility of moral choice.
IONA’s Devil was strategically placed on the front porch of “The House of the Living Tarot”, and is only viewed through the rose window (taken from the Empress room). Above the audience hang the apples of temptation. His wings are the chains that bind him; his fur-covered chair, his beastly domain. He is Lucifer – forsaken by God, and unforgiven.
BRING THE DEVIL INTO YOUR LIFE
The Devil is the card of self-bondage to an idea or belief which is preventing a person from growing or being healthy—an example might be a belief that getting drunk each night is good for you. On the other hand, however, it can also be a warning to someone who is too restrained and/or dispassionate and never allows him or herself to be rash or wild or ambitious, which is yet another form of enslavement.
Ask yourself where you are feeling stuck or restricted in your life. You may be tricked into believing that you are being controlled by external forces when in fact you have created your own chains of imprisonment and powerlessness.
