Tarot of the Imagination

[lilmystic]

Hi everyone! I was just wondering if anyone used the Tarot of the Imagination deck by Ferenc Pinter from Lo Scarabeo. I was fortunate enough to be given it a few days ago, but the meanings are highly untraditional. Does anyone know what tradition Pinter derive the meanings from? Aside from the minor confusion, it's a pleasure to use.

[SittingIdiot]

Dear Lil Mystic,

I love this deck and its images but do not know how the iconography was chosen or why. I have discovered that the deck was originally created by Pinter as trumps-only, printed on fine paper and using larger card size than Lo Scarabeo's (LoS) publication. It was originally regarded as a fine "art deck". I do not know the history (as yet) of LoS getting involved and generating the remaining 56 cards.

I just started collecting and exploring decks and was initially confounded by decks using what would seem to be their own “interpretation” of the cards. This seems esp. applicable for European decks and LoS. I now have several decks from LoS and there seems to be a bit of uniformity in their interpretations that are not similar to our American card ideas.

On this question (who’s interpretation do you use?), a successful, Chicago-area psychic and card reader (Barbara Meyer) said to me, 'don't worry about what the books tell you the card SHOULD BE, look at the image and ask yourself, what do you see?' For example, in this deck by Ferenc Pinter, the 4-Swords (rest, recuperation, confinement, rarely death), shows the storm trooper with rifle before 6 distant peasants, immediately bringing to (my) mind the Nazi holocaust of the Ashkenazi Jews. So, for me, the card accentuates the idea of death, wiping something out, as the companion-leaflet insinuates, never looking them in the eye - never asking why. The 'confinement' takes on a capricious, almost senseless quality; in the card, our view is immediately over the shoulder of the storm trooper, suggesting that the querent is the capricious one. This dark imagry is more consistent with Etteilla's 17th century idea for the card.

Since my favorite cards in the decks are the Court Cards, I am esp. interested in the personalities and portraits Pinter used for these Courts. Obviously, the King of Cups is the infamous Henry VIII of England and the Queen of Wands is Empress Elizabeth of Austria. Other court Cards would seem to be portraits of monarchs and other figures, but I do not recognize them: all the queens would appear to be actual portraits, King-Wands perhaps one of the Kaisers, King-Coins a Spanish or Italian king, a few of the pages and knight appear to be actual historical portraits. I am not at all familiar with European monarchs and do not know how to begin researching through five centuries of numerous national royal houses.

I scanned these cards into a WORD document if anyone wants to see the court cards. I can't figure out how to attach them here. E-mail me if you want to see the scans – maybe you can recognize a few more figures.

[Edited by Moderator to remove e-mail.]

[RiccardoLS]

I may add a bit, about the deck as it was one of my first thing in LS.

As it was said previously the deck started as an Art deck of 22 cards. It was later decided to expand it to 78.
What LS wanted was to give space to Pinter Art into Tarot. It was impossible however to have him do further 56 images so those were taken and adapted from his production.

I don't want to describe Pinter Art. He has the skill of working with shapes with very few lines, creating balance where unbalance should be. It is very inconventional, very painting, very "artistic". Anyway we tried to focus that art into a Tarot deck structure.
We resorted to numerology trying to use the minors as "pips". The scene had not to be taken literally. Rather it would have to be read as one would read a Marseille Tarot... with an abstract set of meaning, but falling in an extremely powerful evocative image. An image calling up emotion, snapshot of ideas, fragments of a concept or of a sentence.
It went out as meditative, Journey deck... a deck of suggestions, of questions and not of answers.

Trying to work on it like one would use a RWS deck is of no use. Of modern decks, the one that get more near it is possible the Secret Forest.
That's why, when I wrote the booklet, I had been trying not to force any meaning. I wanted to express - in a sort of poetic way - a part of a journey. An angle... a point of view.

I don't know if I can express myself... even because that job is so much in the past. But the apparent contradiction of a marseille pip style approach with a meditiation emotion free form... is the key to the deck.
The deck is bound to go very soon out of print... I suppose. But it's still one of my favoured deck. I use it still, time to time, when I have time and I'm alone.
And even if it's a improvised deck... I think it is a good deck. I don't care if all images work or if they all have the same power. Just looking at cards gives me something.

I think that if one get into the Why of each card, and see the story flowing from 1 to 10 in the minors (they are all small hero's journey) he can get a bit more from it.

My preferred cards are the 4 of swords (the killer, his back to us, so I can't see a face... and the victims so far... so little so apparently unconsequential. It gives me a true emotional creep.), the 10 of chalices (it gives so much of an inner peace), 3 of chalices (it is so sad, and so beutiful... I could fall in love with).

best,

Ric

[NightWing]

Thank-you for providing some information on what I think is a rather under-rated and neglected deck. I find it to be one of the more fascinating in my tarot collection, and always discover something new each time I return to it.

Stimulating, quirky, mysterious, layered, even a bit creepy; this is a tarot to grow into and develop a relationship with.

Too bad more people have not given it a chance; it can be very rewarding.

Hopefully the Tarot of the Imagination will be discovered by readers, before it is totally gone from vendors and has effectively vanished.

[6 Haunted Days]

I just recieved this deck today as a gift. It is indeed a most unusual and evocative deck. Very powerful images...a very dark deck in many places. I love many of the courts as they portray kings, queens..a Tsar...King Henry III etc. I was wondering about how to read it as so many of the cards bear little relation to any system I know well. Thanks Ric for telling some of the story and ways to look at and explore this very surreal and strange tarot.

I also looked around for info about it and it is now indeed out of print. This is the only thread I found on AT about it!

[heron]

I really like the Tarot of the Imagination deck a lot, and find it yields very strong meanings when read intuitively. I do sometimes add what would be the "traditonal" RWS interpretations as a kind of additional subtext in a reading. Many of the card images are highly enigmatic (I'm thinking of the Coins in particular - the Seven and Nine seem to have the same three characters in them, but what is going on? The story changes each time I read with them. And what are those desert/archaeology activities on the Four, Six and Ten? Is that a nurse talking to the "Dig Director"?...more questions than answers) And I'm pretty sure that's Teddy Roosevelt as the Knight of Coins.

I have a querent who comes back quite often for readings, and have really got "into" using this deck for her with good results.

How about someone starting a study group for this deck? I'm sure it would give a very fruitful exchange of ideas. If there's anough interest I wouldn't mind being active here...

In hopes
~ heron/Charles

[Le Fanu]

I love this deck. I love the atmosphere, the unease, the sheer odd-ness and the top notch artwork.

However, Ive never been able to make any progress with it. I get it out occasionally and look at all the cards and think " If one were completely intuitive, this would be the deck to go for.." But I don´t think I am yet. Not completely, completely. Almost... :)

These posts have enlightened me, but it is a very difficult deck. Nothing against difficult decks; there should be more of them. And good on LoS for persisting with decks which come at tarot from a different angle. I applaud them for this. And they keep doing it.

In print or not, this deck is sure to be a classic. Maybe not an everyday deck, but it is an important deck I think...