The 36 Flames 🔥

The Journey of Creating My Decan Deck: The 36 Flames

Every creative project begins somewhere, often with a small spark of curiosity. For me, ‘The 36 Flames’ began with a fascination for the decans an ancient astrological system that divides the zodiac into thirty‑six sections, each with its own symbolism, energy, and imagery.

I had always been drawn to the deeper layers of astrology, particularly the older traditions where myth, astronomy, magic, and philosophy intersect. The decans intrigued me because they felt like something hidden in plain sight mentioned in various traditions but often difficult to find clear, accessible information about. The more I searched, the more I realized that understanding them required patience, research, and imagination.

Around that same period, my life had been turned upside down. Sometimes those moments of disruption open unexpected doors. I happened to be taking a class on the PGM (Greek Magical Papyri), where the decans were part of the material being discussed. As an artist, the imagery connected to the decans immediately caught my attention. They were strange, symbolic, and vivid perfect starting points for visual exploration.

That’s when I decided to begin what I called a “Decan walk.” I started creating them one by one, moving through the sequence and allowing each image to develop naturally. At the time, I wasn’t thinking about creating a deck. It was simply a personal artistic exploration—sketching, researching, and gathering fragments of symbolism, mythology, and intuition as I went.

As the images accumulated, something interesting began to happen. Each decan seemed to carry its own atmosphere and personality. They no longer felt like abstract divisions of the zodiac but more like distinct presences, each holding a different tone or mood.

It wasn’t until a few people saw the growing series and suggested that it could become a deck that the idea truly started to take shape. Sometimes you need someone else to point out the direction your work is already moving in. From that point onward, the project began to crystallize into what would eventually become ‘The 36 Flames’.

The name came to me while reflecting on the historical associations of the decans with stars and celestial fire. In ancient traditions, these thirty‑six divisions were connected with the rising of specific stars and with the passage of time across the night sky. Each one felt like a torch marking a stage in a larger cosmic procession. The image of flames seemed fitting, for each Decans own spark, burning within the wider cycle of the zodiac.

Creating the images became a dialogue between research and intuition. I spent time studying traditional descriptions of the decans from older astrological and magical texts, many of which contain wonderfully strange imagery. At the same time, I didn’t want to simply reproduce historical illustrations. I wanted the images to feel alive and relevant today.

My artistic approach naturally gravitates toward layered symbolism. I enjoy working with fragments, faces, textures, and symbolic objects, allowing them to interact and form unexpected relationships. Through this process, the images began to carry a sense of being both ancient and contemporary at the same time, which felt perfectly aligned with the spirit

Some of the cards appeared almost effortlessly, as if they already existed somewhere waiting to be uncovered. Others took much longer. There were moments when an image simply wouldn’t resolve, when the symbolism felt incomplete, and I had to step away before returning with fresh eyes. That rhythm of exploration, frustration, and discovery became part of the creative process.

As the full set began to come together, I started to see how the decans form a kind of narrative when viewed as a whole. Moving through the thirty‑six flames feels like travelling through a landscape of shifting energies, moments of growth, tension, transformation, and renewal. Each card stands on its own, but together they create a larger rhythm that echoes the movement of the zodiac itself.

Looking back, creating ‘The 36 Flames’ has been as much a personal journey as an artistic one. Working with the decans encouraged me to pay closer attention to cycles, symbolism, and the subtle ways images can carry meaning. It reminded me that art and astrology share something important: both are ways of exploring patterns and translating them into forms we can see and experience.

The deck now exists as something tangible that can be held and used, but the exploration doesn’t really end there. Every time I revisit the cards, I notice new connections and nuances I hadn’t seen before. The flames continue to flicker in different ways.

In the end, ‘The 36 Flames’ is an invitation, to explore the decans as living symbols, to look at the sky through an older lens of myth and imagination, and to see what new meanings might emerge along the way.