The High Priestess

The High Priestess is part of an ongoing tarot card series by visual artist and curator Sekai Machache. This series focuses on the Major Arcana. The 2nd Major Arcana card in the Tarot Deck, representing mystery, stillness and reflection, The High Priestess symbolises the time for withdrawal and instinctive self-guidance. In the image, a figure stands illuminated in the dark yawning of a cave, shrouded and still, wearing Blue of the Horizon, a period style dress designed in collaboration with artist and seamstress Fiona Catherine Powell. The figure holds a stance in place that signifies ritualistic movements similar to the gestures in the film Profound Divine Sky. The dress and veil are signifiers of divine knowledge and The High Priestesses’ leadership, usually represented by a blue robe and a horned diadem. In her re-working a dark veil obscures the face, the hands are cradling and bare. Guardian of the subconscious mind she flits between these mind realms without hindrance and provides an ethereal knowledge of the Cosmos, a profound enlightenment on that which is hidden. This image was shot in caves at Auchmithie on the East coast of Scotland during a month long residency period at Hospitalfield House in Arbroath where the artist created her first tarot card in the series, The Hierophant. The High Priestess was captured by Antanas Budvytis with artistic direction, styling, and performance by Sekai Machache.