This month’s spotlight shines on a placement that is always ready for a close-up: Venus in her home sign of Taurus. The planet of love, beauty, relationships, and the arts finds earthy expression in this fixed earth sign, highlighting the solidity of beauty brought into human and concrete form.
Planets in their home signs (also called domiciles) behave exactly as you would expect them to, unconstrained in their missions and able to express themselves fully. Being at home and free to behave as they want, instead of subject to another planet’s rules, planets in domicile are among the strongest possible placements in a natal chart, automatically strengthening any other houses they rule (in this case that would be the Libra house, whose ruler, Venus would be in its other home sign of Taurus). As one of the traditional benefic planets, along with Jupiter, Venus in its domicile is a great blessing, spreading its gifts in the artistic, relational, and aesthetic realms throughout the charts of those born with this placement.
In Taurus, Venus is the artist, the singer, the patron of the arts, the gourmet, the bon vivant. Notable individuals with this placement include Salvador Dalí, Astor Piazzolla, Oleg Cassini, Ellsworth Kelly, Marlon Brando, Tennessee Williams, Ella Fitzgerald, João Gilberto, Merce Cunningham, Paul McCartney, Joël Robuchon, Burt Bacharach, Prince, Johnny Depp, Liv Tyler, Alanis Morissette, Peter Dinklage, and Lana Del Ray.
Venus in Taurus is driven to express their creativity in solid, corporeal form. The work of artists with this placement is often described in terms like earthy, sensual, grounded, magnetic, physical. There is an internal sense of harmony, a preoccupation with form, a solidity, even in ephemeral art forms, such as dance.
Speaking of dance, the modern dance choreographer Merce Cunningham, with the sun in Aires and Venus in Taurus, was known for his groundbreaking choreography, which played with concepts of structured improvisation and chance operations. He began his career dancing with Martha Graham, as a soloist in her company, before founding his own company in 1953. Interestingly, Graham had the opposite of her protege’s placements, with the sun in Taurus and Venus in Aires, and their aesthetic differences are notable in their choreography and movement style.
Cunningham’s choreography, while strikingly modern, often accompanied by the iconoclastic music of his parter, John Cage, nevertheless embodies an almost classical celebration of harmonious, terpsichorean form. Graham, with her grounding in ancient mythology and interest in piercing human narratives, propels her choreography with a driving force emanating from the dancers’ cores.
I studied Cunningham technique for several years, after an introduction to modern dance through the Graham technique. The contrast between the two styles, as experienced in the body, couldn’t be stronger, even though Cunningham could be considered in the same lineage as Graham. Despite its overt modernism and conceptual bent, Cunningham technique feels connected to ballet and its concepts of the body and movement as a form of harmonics. There is a grace and purity of form in Cunningham technique that also feels sustainable in the body.
Graham technique, on the other hand, at least my experience of it, has a sort of violence in the way it propels out of the primary action of the contraction — a pulling in of the abdomen so that the spine curves, the pelvis tucking under. The contraction is the primal source of all movement in Graham technique, lending a feeling of tension throughout. The aesthetic is striking, powerful, and individualistic, as befits Venus in Aires, who has to work harder in the Mars-ruled sign of her exile.
To take advantage of Venus in Taurus, from April 14th through May 8th, when Venus moves into cerebral Gemini, focus on the house of your natal chart where Taurus falls. (To generate a free birth chart, visit www.astro-seek.com. I recommend choosing Whole Sign Houses under Extended Settings.) This house will be the area of life in which you can experience Venus in Taurus’ earthy sensuality and luxury. Taurus rising? That would be the first house, with Venus offering the possibility of luxurious renewal of your body and appearance. Get a haircut (following health precautions, of course), upgrade your wardrobe, pamper yourself. Taurus second house (Aires rising)? Venus in the house of personal income presents an opportunity to begin a new income stream. And so on.
No matter which house Venus is transiting this month, the golden moment of a benefic planet in one of its home signs is a wonderful opportunity to focus on the topics of that planet (love, relationships, arts, and beauty, with Venus) and how they can be supported in your life.
But watch out for a couple of potential unpredictable dates as Venus threads her way through Taurus: on April 22nd, Venus conjoins with revolutionary Uranus, hanging out in Taurus since 2018 and unsettling the placid nerves of this normally predictable sign. Surprises in relational, artistic, or aesthetic matters could pop up.
Then, on April 25th, Venus faces a challenge in a square to Saturn in Aquarius. There could be a sense of limitations or restrictions, the plug pulled on Venus’ velvet and champagne party by Saturn, the cranky neighbor downstairs. Our fledgling attempts to resurrect our in-person relationships may be shut down or restricted. But Venus in Taurus always has a coping mechanism — a gourmet meal and a soak in the tub, best-quality chocolate, and silk pajamas, or whatever your version of that might be.