3 ms·

The card images are from this deck: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rider–Waite_tarot_deck https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rider–Waite_tarot_deck

aasasd 5y ago
I've long ago bought me a copy of that deck purely for how good it looks. Everything else is either old and crooked, or crayon drawings by some psycho nerd (ahem Crowley/Harris cough), or straight up Boris Vallejo style. Plus some are influenced by Rider-Waite. Meanwhile Rider-Waite is pretty much Marseilles-but-good. I don't even do anything tarot, and owe the knowledge of its existence primarily to ‘The Ogre Battle’ and Alejandro Jodorowsky. Should probably learn to do some kind of dealing for when I need a decision, in lieu of coin and dice. (Mildly curiously, the cards I bought had original English titles—unusual because they accompanied a book in Russian, and the target audience is IMO unlikely to casually know English.)
- disgruntledphd2 5y ago
  Wow, I actually much prefer the Crowley Harris deck, just for the sheer amount of detail. The Rider-Waite just looks kinda boring to me, to be honest.
  - pukexxr 5y ago
    Rider-Waite, Marseille, and Crowley-Harris are the trinity for me, personally speaking.
  - aasasd 5y ago
    Eh, I pretty much apply modernist thinking to my mystic symbolism: I like the symbols clear and concise. Excessive decoration just takes away from the message of the symbols, and suggests either that the author might be unsure that they can impart the symbols well enough, or that there are additional meanings in these details—which is probably untrue. Plus, in this post-psychedelic age, the detailed drawings look like self-parody, in the spirit of ‘horror vacui’. Compare e.g. art by Rammellzee and James Koehnline for various outfits of Bill Laswell: https://www.discogs.com/release/57834-Altered-Beats-Assassin-Knowledges-Of-The-Remanipulated/images https://www.discogs.com/release/57834-Altered-Beats-Assassin... https://www.discogs.com/release/2166602-Various-Axiom-Dub-Mysteries-Of-Creation/images https://www.discogs.com/release/2166602-Various-Axiom-Dub-My... https://www.discogs.com/release/196685-Transmutation-Mutatis-Mutandis/images https://www.discogs.com/release/196685-Transmutation-Mutatis... https://www.discogs.com/release/1228556-Profanation-Preparation-For-A-Coming-Darkness/images https://www.discogs.com/release/1228556-Profanation-Preparat... I feel that this is what Crowley would've done if he had Photoshop in his day. The dude had plenty of troll attitude, IMO. (Also I discovered this paragraph in the Wikipedia entry on ‘horror vacui’, which sounds sorta funny in this context (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horror_vacui https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horror_vacui): There is an inverse relationship between horror vacui and value perception. Commercial designers favor visual clarity in shop window displays and advertising to appeal to affluent and well-educated consumers, on the premise that understatement and restraint appeals to more affluent and educated audiences. In one study, 100 clothing stores were surveyed to find patterns and relationship between how efficiently the store's real estate was used and the store's brand prestige. Bulk sales shops and chain stores were found to fill their window displays to maximum capacity; while high-end boutiques often used their space sparsely, with no price tags.)
    - YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
      Hah, Mr. Crowley was a total troll. But he was an artist's and interlectuarl's mystic, so his tarot was specifically designed to look like it belong to an upper-middle class practitioner, rather than a commoner, with traditional but incomplete understadning of the Art. He basically wanted to elevate Tarot reading from the palmistry tent at fairs to the salons of the nouveau rich, so he chose art and interpretations that would appeal to that kind of person. A troll and a real marketing genius, I think.
      - aasasd 5y ago
        Ooh, this does remind me that I need to figure out mass-culture and highbrow design values before modernism, since I indeed might apply modern thinking where it doesn't belong, sometimes. I vaguely know that it was ‘more stuff = rich’ in the middle ages, leading to the ridiculous outfits of the aristocracy, but not sure when it switched to pure modernist ‘lots of empty space = rich’ (https://i.pinimg.com/originals/67/87/56/678756c714c2bd405964b7f320776437.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/67/87/56/678756c714c2bd405964...).
  - JKCalhoun 5y ago
    My favorite (for the artwork) to date (scroll down to see all the cards): https://robertmplacetarot.com/the-alchemical-tarot-renewed-4th-edition/ https://robertmplacetarot.com/the-alchemical-tarot-renewed-4...
- Pamar 5y ago
  About "when I need a decision" - you might like this: http://www.pa-mar.net/Lifestyle/I-Ching.html http://www.pa-mar.net/Lifestyle/I-Ching.html (disclaimer: I am the author).

aasasd 5y ago

I've long ago bought me a copy of that deck purely for how good it looks. Everything else is either old and crooked, or crayon drawings by some psycho nerd (ahem Crowley/Harris cough), or straight up Boris Vallejo style. Plus some are influenced by Rider-Waite. Meanwhile Rider-Waite is pretty much Marseilles-but-good. I don't even do anything tarot, and owe the knowledge of its existence primarily to ‘The Ogre Battle’ and Alejandro Jodorowsky. Should probably learn to do some kind of dealing for when I need a decision, in lieu of coin and dice. (Mildly curiously, the cards I bought had original English titles—unusual because they accompanied a book in Russian, and the target audience is IMO unlikely to casually know English.)

disgruntledphd2 5y ago
Wow, I actually much prefer the Crowley Harris deck, just for the sheer amount of detail. The Rider-Waite just looks kinda boring to me, to be honest.
- pukexxr 5y ago
  Rider-Waite, Marseille, and Crowley-Harris are the trinity for me, personally speaking.
- aasasd 5y ago
  Eh, I pretty much apply modernist thinking to my mystic symbolism: I like the symbols clear and concise. Excessive decoration just takes away from the message of the symbols, and suggests either that the author might be unsure that they can impart the symbols well enough, or that there are additional meanings in these details—which is probably untrue. Plus, in this post-psychedelic age, the detailed drawings look like self-parody, in the spirit of ‘horror vacui’. Compare e.g. art by Rammellzee and James Koehnline for various outfits of Bill Laswell: https://www.discogs.com/release/57834-Altered-Beats-Assassin-Knowledges-Of-The-Remanipulated/images https://www.discogs.com/release/57834-Altered-Beats-Assassin... https://www.discogs.com/release/2166602-Various-Axiom-Dub-Mysteries-Of-Creation/images https://www.discogs.com/release/2166602-Various-Axiom-Dub-My... https://www.discogs.com/release/196685-Transmutation-Mutatis-Mutandis/images https://www.discogs.com/release/196685-Transmutation-Mutatis... https://www.discogs.com/release/1228556-Profanation-Preparation-For-A-Coming-Darkness/images https://www.discogs.com/release/1228556-Profanation-Preparat... I feel that this is what Crowley would've done if he had Photoshop in his day. The dude had plenty of troll attitude, IMO. (Also I discovered this paragraph in the Wikipedia entry on ‘horror vacui’, which sounds sorta funny in this context (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horror_vacui https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horror_vacui): There is an inverse relationship between horror vacui and value perception. Commercial designers favor visual clarity in shop window displays and advertising to appeal to affluent and well-educated consumers, on the premise that understatement and restraint appeals to more affluent and educated audiences. In one study, 100 clothing stores were surveyed to find patterns and relationship between how efficiently the store's real estate was used and the store's brand prestige. Bulk sales shops and chain stores were found to fill their window displays to maximum capacity; while high-end boutiques often used their space sparsely, with no price tags.)
  - YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
    Hah, Mr. Crowley was a total troll. But he was an artist's and interlectuarl's mystic, so his tarot was specifically designed to look like it belong to an upper-middle class practitioner, rather than a commoner, with traditional but incomplete understadning of the Art. He basically wanted to elevate Tarot reading from the palmistry tent at fairs to the salons of the nouveau rich, so he chose art and interpretations that would appeal to that kind of person. A troll and a real marketing genius, I think.
    - aasasd 5y ago
      Ooh, this does remind me that I need to figure out mass-culture and highbrow design values before modernism, since I indeed might apply modern thinking where it doesn't belong, sometimes. I vaguely know that it was ‘more stuff = rich’ in the middle ages, leading to the ridiculous outfits of the aristocracy, but not sure when it switched to pure modernist ‘lots of empty space = rich’ (https://i.pinimg.com/originals/67/87/56/678756c714c2bd405964b7f320776437.jpg https://i.pinimg.com/originals/67/87/56/678756c714c2bd405964...).
- JKCalhoun 5y ago
  My favorite (for the artwork) to date (scroll down to see all the cards): https://robertmplacetarot.com/the-alchemical-tarot-renewed-4th-edition/ https://robertmplacetarot.com/the-alchemical-tarot-renewed-4...
Pamar 5y ago
About "when I need a decision" - you might like this: http://www.pa-mar.net/Lifestyle/I-Ching.html http://www.pa-mar.net/Lifestyle/I-Ching.html (disclaimer: I am the author).