...and how much stress do you place on the “feeling” you get from cards through their artwork/symbolism, etc.? Do you do both, or one or the other?
I hold with the "textbook" meanings first and foremost, then the LWB that shipped with the deck (if there is one) and anything particular the artist is saying with their rendition. While it certainly helps to have a deck with gorgeous art, I rarely lean on the art alone to convey meaning. (Especially because there are many cards where the art is a nonstarter for me.) Generally speaking, I hold with Ginny Hunt about "the Tarot bones."
Which is funny, because as a system Tarot is not that old and it seems a bit ridiculous to get all in a huff about historical accuracy and so on. But at the end of the day I am a creature of structure and orderliness, so I opt to to read Tarot instead of using a Tarot deck to read intuitively. I do not really experience sudden, prophetic flashes of inspiration the way that many Tarot readers seem to do.
Besides that, I think very few people have enough intuition to go diving into cards without a lot of study first. If nothing else, study shows that you are dedicated to your craft and to being the best that you can be at it. Like with writing, you gotta know the rules before you break them.