Pamela was influenced by many different events and circumstances in her life. Theater scenes were certainly powerful. Her time with the famed actress Ellen Terry proved pivotal in her life. Her ability to paint interpretations of music from Bach, Debussy and other composers was a strong influence. She moved around a lot, initially with her parents, and she was exposed to different cultures. Certainly, the influence of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, along with Arthur Edward Waite, the Yeats brothers, [ref. W B Yeats] and other luminaries she met, all contributed to her knowledge and ultimate expression in her work...
Malcolm Muckle
The mystical side of PCS seems almost hereditary, given her previous generations' interest in the spiritual philosophy of Swedenborg; this must surely have been enhanced by her contact with W. B. Yeats (a member of a reading group of Swedenborg's works) with whom I gather she felt a close affinity despite their age difference. Yet her own beliefs eventually turned to Catholicism - maybe under Waite's influence. Did PCS produce much artistic work after that?
Stuart Kaplan
Pamela enjoyed some initial exposure in a series of Broad Sheets published in 1902, and The Green Sheaf editions released in 1903. Her star appeared to be rising in 1907 when Alfred Stieglitz exhibited her work in his Gallery 291 in New York City, and she received positive reviews. In 1909 she drew the designs for the Rider-Waite Tarot deck for very little money. She also illustrated several books, and tried publishing ventures, but by 1915 her artistic efforts seem to have faded. It is hard to say whether her decision to convert to Catholicism led to her diminished artist interests. More likely, the fact that her efforts did not prove financially successful played a greater part in her decision to try to earn a livelihood elsewhere...
Malcolm Muckle
In reviewing what I know and have read about Pixie, I can't help but be struck by a sense of sadness at her life; she seemed to have such extraordinary gifts, and yet her life seemed to have gone into reverse after about 1908/9 with her art undergoing enhanced inappreciation, if I can put it that way, despite the superb artistic reviews she had received earlier in New York. There was almost a long, slow retreat from the world and from people. Why do you think that was?
Stuart Kaplan
I believe that after her exciting life with Ellen Terry, Pamela was very lonely. Her poem, Alone, is a sad commentary to her feelings of inadequacy and lack of recognition. In 1914 she gave away her personal Visitors Book with the sad inscription inside the back cover stating that she didn’t like people any more. She withdrew because people did not appreciate her. She didn’t really fit into the British life as we imagine it. She would sit on the floor before a group of her friends and tell Jamaican stories. She was very esoteric in her life style.
Malcolm Muckle
In common with many people who have had a childhood in more than one country, PCS seems to have experienced a sense of dislocation from ordinary life. Was art a way of assuaging this?
Stuart Kaplan
Actually, I think for a while Pamela thrived in her unusual life style. She would hold soirees with intimate friends, sitting on the floor and was, for a short period of time, the center of attraction for a small group who found her different, childlike, amusing, talented, but it all eventually faded. For a time, art was a escape, a way for her to express herself, but it could not carry her into a happy life.
Malcolm Muckle
Looking at the - one can only use the word "famous" - Rider-Waite/Smith Tarot deck, how much of the design came from PCS and how much from Waite; was PCS left alone to do the "pips"?
Stuart Kaplan
Much has been made of the influence of Arthur Edward Waite in Pamela’s renderings of the 78 card tarot deck. The fact is, as illustrated in the chapter on Pamela Colman Smith in Volume III of The Encyclopedia of Tarot, I show several cards that clearly bear a strong resemblance to the Sola-Busca pack originally prepared in the fifteen century. I believe Pamela drew in large measure upon her own vision and interpretations, and there were certainly outside influence from people such as Waite.