“FLORA”
Pastel, digital, ink
“TEMENUS”
Watercolour, digital
“BABEL”
Watercolour, ink, pastel, digital
“VERTE”
Watercolour, pen, ink, digital
“CATALYT”
Watercolour, ink, digital
The Philosophy of Re-Enchantment
“The Philosophy of Re-Enchantment” developed gradually through my life as an artist. It is not a doctrine or belief system, but a way of engaging with the world through imagination, symbolism, and creative participation. At its heart lies a simple question:
What happens when adults are given permission to play again?
As children, we instinctively learn through play. We collect, compare, arrange, invent stories, recognise patterns, and delight in unexpected connections. Through these playful acts we begin to understand ourselves and the world around us. Yet somewhere along the way, many of us learn to replace curiosity with certainty, process with outcome, and exploration with productivity.
I do not believe our capacity for play disappears as we grow older. I believe it simply becomes neglected.
“The Philosophy of Re-Enchantment”, proposes that personal exploration, creative expression, and play through art remain essential throughout adult life. Art is not simply something to admire or master. It is a way of thinking, questioning, reflecting, and participating. The creative process becomes a conversation between imagination, memory, intuition, lived experience, and the world itself.
At the heart of this philosophy are four interconnected pillars that underpin every aspect of “Inner World Illumination” (IWI).
IMAGINATION allows us to think symbolically, to dream, to wonder, and to explore possibilities beyond the literal.
CREATIVITY gives form to imagination through making. Whether drawing, painting, writing, or constructing symbolic objects, creativity transforms inner experience into something tangible.
REFLECTION allows us to recognise patterns and cultivate self-awareness. Dreams, journalling, mythology, symbolic systems, and contemplative practice all become ways of entering into dialogue with ourselves.
RITUAL gives intention to creativity. It is found in the repeated acts of making, observing, arranging, walking, collecting, preparing materials, or returning to a creative practice with presence and purpose.
These four pillars continually nourish one another. Imagination inspires creativity. Creativity invites reflection. Reflection gives rise to ritual. Ritual creates the conditions for imagination to flourish once again.
Although art has become the centre of my practice, astrology and tarot profoundly shaped the way I came to understand symbolism. They taught me to think through images rather than definitions, through patterns rather than isolated events, and through cycles rather than straight lines. They encouraged me to understand meaning as something that emerges through relationship rather than certainty.
Over time, I came to see astrology and tarot not primarily as systems of prediction, but as fields of symbolic play. Their greatest gift lies in their ability to invite curiosity, experimentation, imagination, and reflection.
The act of participation is every bit as important as interpretation.
Shuffling a deck of cards. Rearranging images across a table. Searching for unexpected relationships. Creating mandalas from symbolic forms. Observing the geometry traced by planets through the heavens. Recording dreams. Walking through nature. Making paintings. These are all creative acts that invite us into conversation with the symbolic world.
Much like Carl Jung's daily mandala practice, meaning develops through participation. Symbols do not simply provide answers. They become companions in an ongoing dialogue with the imagination.
Looking into the night sky still fills me with the same sense of wonder I experienced as a child. We are reminded that we are only a small part of an immeasurably vast universe, yet at the same time intimately connected to it. Wonder has the remarkable ability to expand our perspective while deepening our sense of belonging.
As my artistic practice evolved, these ways of seeing naturally extended beyond astrology and tarot. Dreams, mythology, folklore, psychology, ecology, ritual, and the natural world gradually revealed themselves to be part of the same symbolic conversation. Rather than existing as separate disciplines, they became different ways of exploring imagination and human experience.
This philosophy finds its fullest expression in the 52-card “IWI Lexicon”.
The Lexicon is neither a traditional oracle deck nor simply a collection of artworks. It is a symbolic visual language designed for creative exploration. The cards are intended to be handled, rearranged, grouped, compared, and reconfigured into mandalas, constellations, and evolving compositions. Meaning extends far beyond an individual card. It emerges through the dialogue between images, memory, imagination, lived experience, and play.
The conceptual framework for the Lexicon has now been completed, and I am currently painting each of the fifty-two individual artworks that will ultimately form the finished deck.
For many years I have told my students that reducing tarot to divination is like owning a Formula One race car and only driving it to the supermarket for milk.
This is not because I dismiss readings. I have seen how a thoughtful reading can be inspiring, validating, and empowering. They can help people feel seen, offer new perspectives, and provide language for experiences that have been difficult to articulate. Readings can open a door.
Over time, however, I have found that the deepest and most enduring transformation comes through active participation rather than passive reception. Whether making art, exploring dreams, engaging with symbols, or reflecting on our own experiences, it is the process of discovery that cultivates lasting insight. Rather than waiting for meaning to be given to us, we begin to create it ourselves through curiosity, imagination, and creative practice.
Perhaps this is why teaching has become the heart of my work.
While I continue to value readings, I have come to realise that my greatest gift is helping others develop the confidence to explore their own inner world. There is something profoundly rewarding about witnessing someone recognise their own capacity for imagination, symbolic thinking, and creative expression. My hope is that people leave not simply with an answer, but with the confidence, curiosity, and creative tools to continue exploring long after our time together has ended.
“Inner World Illumination”, grew directly from these ideas. Every artwork, class, symbolic framework, educational resource, and creative session I offer is informed by “The Philosophy of Re-Enchantment”.
Re-enchantment is not about abandoning reason or embracing blind faith. It is about recognising that imagination, symbolism, creativity, reflection, and ritual remain fundamental ways of understanding ourselves and our relationship with the world. It invites us to become active participants in meaning-making; to cultivate wonder, embrace curiosity, and approach life with the openness of a child and the discernment of an adult.
For me, re-enchantment is ultimately an artistic practice. It is a lifelong invitation to imagine, create, reflect, and participate. To make meaning rather than merely seek it.To rediscover that creativity is not separate from life, it is one of the ways we learn to live it more fully.