We’re all artists just by the fact that we’re human beings. We are creators, and we are creating our lives every single day—co-creating them. The more consciousness we can bring to that process and the more integration between the various levels of our being—the above and below, the conscious and the unconscious—the more agency we have in shaping our experience.
Whether it’s through the way we structure our days, the rituals we choose, or the meals we craft with intention, our lives become our canvas. And art, in its highest form, becomes a sacred dialogue between our inner world and the mystery beyond.
“To live deliciously is to let your soul flow through matter, to make beauty a sacrament.”
“Gnosis is remembering that you are the creator—and the creation.”
Art is a Spiritual Technology: Creative expression serves as a channel for processing unconscious material, transmuting shadow, and invoking archetypal forces.
The Nigredo is a Gateway: The “dark night of the soul” is the alchemical starting point of transformation. It is not to be bypassed but entered and mined for gold.
Hermeticism Lives in the Body: Ancient Hermetic principles, including the Caduceus and planetary archetypes, map directly onto the energetic and psychological dimensions of the human body.
Dreams are Dialogues with the Daimon: Dreams offer symbolic insight from the unconscious and archetypal realms. When explored through art or active imagination, they become transformative guides.
Planetary Magic as Inner Alchemy: The planetary archetypes can be approached through ritual, astrology, devotional art, or even spontaneous life engagement, each offering a mirror and medicine for the soul.
Gnosis is Lived, Not Attained: True gnosis isn’t a static enlightenment but an ongoing intimacy with the self, the cosmos, and the divine unfolding within.
Everything is Communication: The universe, dreams, body sensations, synchronicities—everything is speaking. Silence and attention are the prerequisites for listening.
“We are artists by nature—crafting not only paintings, but entire realities from the substance of our soul.”
“The dark night of the soul isn’t punishment—it’s the prima materia of your becoming.”
In this episode, Adam Nox interviews the brilliant Marlena Seven Bremner—surrealist painter, Hermetic scholar, and author of Hermetic Philosophy and Creative Alchemy. Her story begins in the body, through polarity therapy and natural healing, and unfolds into the realms of alchemy, active imagination, and planetary archetypes. As she explains, art became her vessel for transformation during her personal “nigredo”—a blackening, a dark night of the soul catalyzed by a mystical DMT experience that shattered the boundaries of her known self.
Rather than escape this abyss, she plunged into it. Through writing, painting, and communion with archetypes via dream and symbol, Marlena began to transmute chaos into beauty and integrate shadow into wholeness.
Carl Jung’s psychological alchemy, the dream logic of the unconscious, and the esoteric maps of Hermeticism became her companions. From Saturn’s grounding root to Venus’ relational grace, she weaves planetary forces through the chakra system, revealing the Hermetic body as a temple and the soul’s evolution as art itself.
Art is not separate from magic—it is magic. Whether by planetary devotional practice, intuitive sigil-crafting, or spontaneous dream work, Marlena shows how creation becomes invocation, and how beauty becomes a kind of spiritual gnosis.
The episode closes with a meditation on the Eight Sphere—the Hermetic realm of flow—where polarities dance, timing aligns, and one’s entire life can become a work of alchemical art.
She has a BA in Geography and Environmental Studies and is trained as a Polarity Therapist by the Institute of Holistic Health Careers. She is a self-taught oil painter, author, poet, and musician, exploring esoteric themes arising from her study and practice of Hermeticism, alchemy, magic, astrology, and mythology.
She is the author of Hermetic Philosophy and Creative Alchemy: The Emerald Tablet, the Corpus Hermeticum, and the Journey Through the Seven Spheres (Inner Traditions, 2022), and The Hermetic Marriage of Art and Alchemy: Imagination, Creativity, and the Great Work (Inner Traditions, 2023).
“Hermeticism teaches that what’s above is below, and what’s within is the cosmos itself.”
“True magic begins when art becomes devotion and the unconscious becomes your guide.”
“Dreams are not illusions—they are messages from your eternal self in symbolic form.”
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