Deck of the Week : Sign-up Thread: Week 297 : April 8 - April 14

Dogs&Coffee

I'm in with the Norisan Bird Tarot, and spirit de la lune still.
 

Carojulie

Hello friends !
Thank you VG for the link to this new thread, I love that.

I am going to spend one more week with the Oriental tarot.

I am in love with the delicacy of the illustrations, the thin ink drawings and the soft watercolors.

I am also re-discovering the pleasure of a Marseille style deck. As much as I love illustrated pips, I also love the space of interpretation given by non illustrated pips. I had not worked with a non scenic pip decks in a while, probably two month.... though I really enjoy to do it (but I also have a lot of scenic pips decks that I love, especially RWS style, and you can only work with not that many deck at a time ! )

A reason why I enjoy non scenic pip decks is that I feel as if Marseille style decks give me two contradictory things : freedom AND order. I will try to explain :

The fact that pips are non scenic, gives me a lot of freedom, and opens wide the door to intuition. I am not "bound" by the way the artist puts their own interpretation on the cards. The pip cards become an open door to whatever interpretation I feel will suit the card best.
But in the same time, not having an illustartion forces me to be very precise, "technical" in my analisys of the card, or else it would lead to nonsense or imprecision. It forces me to remember what little book knowledge I have of tarot, and to rely on suits and numbers even more than when I deal with a RWS style deck. It is an intellectual exercise as well as an intuitive one.

This mix of wide freedom and precision, I enjoy it a lot.
And, this Oriental tarot, it is SO beautiful ! The whole deck gives a soft, light energy. The light airy cardstock is part of that light energy, and the images... I love it.

I am saying it is a Marseille style deck because of the pips, and of its italian and french origins (it seems that Foudraz was french and spent part of his life in Turin ?), and the fact that initally the illustrations are anterior to the RWS and Thoth (I hope I am not mistaken here, please correct me if I am wrong !)
But it is also a lot different from the traditional Marseille deck, in that the majors are designed with more liberty. You recognise each major extremely easily, but the traditional symbols found on Marseille majors are sometimes different or absent.
In that way, this Oriental tarot is made on a TdM structure, with much liberty given in the illustrations.

It makes me travel to China in my head, a little... but mostly, it doesn't transport me in Asia per se, but it makes me think more of the big "Exposition Universelle" in Paris in the second half of the XIX century, when Asian art and culture was celebrated in Europe. To me, it shows Chinese characters through the lenses of a European illustrator of the 1830s, 1840s, 1850s, 1860s.... For that reason, I find that it has a sort of naïveté that touches me a lot.

I hope you all have a great weekend, and I hope you have time to use your decks of choice ! Much warmth ot all of you !
 

Rose Lalonde

Hello friends !
Thank you VG for the link to this new thread, I love that.

I am going to spend one more week with the Oriental tarot.

I am in love with the delicacy of the illustrations, the thin ink drawings and the soft watercolors.

I am also re-discovering the pleasure of a Marseille style deck. As much as I love illustrated pips, I also love the space of interpretation given by non illustrated pips. I had not worked with a non scenic pip decks in a while, probably two month.... though I really enjoy to do it (but I also have a lot of scenic pips decks that I love, especially RWS style, and you can only work with not that many deck at a time ! )

A reason why I enjoy non scenic pip decks is that I feel as if Marseille style decks give me two contradictory things : freedom AND order. I will try to explain :

The fact that pips are non scenic, gives me a lot of freedom, and opens wide the door to intuition. I am not "bound" by the way the artist puts their own interpretation on the cards. The pip cards become an open door to whatever interpretation I feel will suit the card best.
But in the same time, not having an illustartion forces me to be very precise, "technical" in my analisys of the card, or else it would lead to nonsense or imprecision. It forces me to remember what little book knowledge I have of tarot, and to rely on suits and numbers even more than when I deal with a RWS style deck. It is an intellectual exercise as well as an intuitive one.

This mix of wide freedom and precision, I enjoy it a lot.
And, this Oriental tarot, it is SO beautiful ! The whole deck gives a soft, light energy. The light airy cardstock is part of that light energy, and the images... I love it.

I am saying it is a Marseille style deck because of the pips, and of its italian and french origins (it seems that Foudraz was french and spent part of his life in Turin ?), and the fact that initally the illustrations are anterior to the RWS and Thoth (I hope I am not mistaken here, please correct me if I am wrong !)
But it is also a lot different from the traditional Marseille deck, in that the majors are designed with more liberty. You recognise each major extremely easily, but the traditional symbols found on Marseille majors are sometimes different or absent.
In that way, this Oriental tarot is made on a TdM structure, with much liberty given in the illustrations.

It makes me travel to China in my head, a little... but mostly, it doesn't transport me in Asia per se, but it makes me think more of the big "Exposition Universelle" in Paris in the second half of the XIX century, when Asian art and culture was celebrated in Europe. To me, it shows Chinese characters through the lenses of a European illustrator of the 1850s. For that reason, I find that it has a sort of naïveté that touches me a lot.

I hope you all have a great weekend, and I hope you have time to use your decks of choice ! Much warmth ot all of you !


Great post!

I agree about a sense of openness and freedom in TdM. The Oriental's airy look seems like it would give an even more open feeling. (Plus those little ribbons on cards like the 10 of Swords look so delicate). -- My shuffle deck is a TdM, so regardless of which deck I'm going to read with, I see TdM images first. Although I didn't plan it out, thinking about it now I'm sure I gravitated to it for shuffling because it doesn't narrow down meaning at first glance the way illustrated pips would.

And 1850s is prior to the Golden Dawn, so I guess the only thing overlaid on your deck that I know of would be that partly informed and partly fanciful understanding of China, which looks charming as you said. Glad you're enjoying it. :)
 

CharlotteK

Hi VG, thanks for a new thread. The past week has gone so quickly! I am also going to go with Tabula Mundi as my main deck this coming week.
 

Rose Lalonde

Tabula Mundi (&Waite-Smith Centennial)

Posted re the Tabula Mundi 5 of Cups in TM "daily' draws. With every card I love the deck more, which hardly seems possible anymore. 50 TM cards posted about on the forum so far, 28 to go...

Managed to bring this week's comparison deck (Waite-Smith Centennial) into the post a little.

I'm really enjoying the combo of one tarot that stays the same every week and a second that rotates out weekly, so I'm glad DotW group started me doing that. :)
 

RiverRunsDeep

Am I too late?? I'll be working with my Tarot of Hekate again this week. Thank you, VG!!!
 

Amberjune

Hi everybody :)

I'm in with the Idiosyncradeck Tarot and the Secret Language Animals Oracle.

Blessed week!
 

Scarlet Woodland

I keep forgetting just how much I love The Wild Unknown when we spend a little time apart. It really is ridculously good.
 

Ballerina

Didn't see this week's signup till now but glad I did. It does help keep me accountable. I'm spending another week with The Greenman Tree Oracle. The cards really draw me in and I'm very much enjoying reading the book again.

Have a great week everyone!