Decks with women who aren't in floaty dresses.

Madrigal

World Spirit Tarot fits the bill for me. The woodcut medium produces a wonderfully muscular array of figures. The women are viscerally strong.
 

athenafletcher

It's not out yet, but Our Tarot by Sarah Shipman is an all-women deck that features real women from history (no mythological figures or goddesses). It reached its Kickstarter funding goal in December and is expected to be out in September this year.

Some of the women who will be in the deck include (taken from the Kickstarter page FAQ): Benazir Bhutto, Shirley Chisholm, Josephine Baker, Anne Frank, Wu Zeitan, Queen Elizabeth I, Mary Wollenstonecraft, Nefertiti, Sophie Scholl, Isabella I of Castile, Toni Wolff, Hypatia of Alexandria, Assata Shakur, Rigoberta Menchu, Queen Nzinga, Mary Stuart of Scotland, Jane Austen, Julia Kristeva

https://www.our-tarot.com/order/ourtarot
 

Anise

Barbieri’s smug QoW popped into my mind as I read your post. The deck has a lot of trouser-wearing, shorter-haired women. There are more women than men, and definitely more pants than dresses/robes. There might even be more dragons than dresses in this deck, lol. To a lesser extent, the Epic Tarot has women/androgynous folk in pants and armor, and also dresses…but they look like adventurers, not decor. The 8 of Cups is like the fantasy version of someone staring at a Tom Cruise poster wanting to be him. =P
 

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euripides

Barbieri’s smug QoW popped into my mind as I read your post. The deck has a lot of trouser-wearing, shorter-haired women. There are more women than men, and definitely more pants than dresses/robes. There might even be more dragons than dresses in this deck, lol. To a lesser extent, the Epic Tarot has women/androgynous folk in pants and armor, and also dresses…but they look like adventurers, not decor. The 8 of Cups is like the fantasy version of someone staring at a Tom Cruise poster wanting to be him. =P

Hmm yeah but the aesthetic of be Barbieri is still very much the body-on-display, woman-as-decoration (despite the very cool Queen of Wands). The Epic is the similar - though I agree, more interesting than many - but still all hair-piled-on-heads and feminity as fragile.

If they put a woman in armor, it has to be boob contoured and with lots of bare skin....

We are so very deeply, historically and culturally and psychologically embedded in these arche-stereo-types that it's almost impossible to shake them. If you portray a strong woman in combat gear, *that's* a statement and she's implicitly being feminist/lesbian/nonconformist...

you can't utter a statement outside of the language that we use.
 

nisaba

I'm just happy when the women have clothes on......

<cackle>

The As Above and So Below Pagan decks both have women in jeans driving cars and using computers.

The Stick Figure Tarot is an interesting and amusing novelty - the women don't even really have genders, let alone floating clothes!

Is now the time to sing the praises of the Kilted Rubber Chicken deck, where the blokes wear the skirts, or the Cephalopod deck?
 

Morwenna

Hmm yeah but the aesthetic of be Barbieri is still very much the body-on-display, woman-as-decoration (despite the very cool Queen of Wands). The Epic is the similar - though I agree, more interesting than many - but still all hair-piled-on-heads and feminity as fragile.

I think a lot of men in Tarot decks are decorative too. :) I'd say their bodies are on display!
 

euripides

I think a lot of men in Tarot decks are decorative too. :) I'd say their bodies are on display!

True. But while this is an increasing trend in contemporary culture, it isn't the default, and I'm not arguing about that. The default position for the male is the Actor, the Agent, the Subject, while women are, 90% of the time the Object.

Even the female knight of wands is artfully arranged on a chair. I want Artemisia's Judith, hacking of her foe's head.

I do armored combat in the SCA, and I can tell you, you don't feel dainty and sexy in armor. You feel hot, sweaty and aggressive.

It's interesting that many of the 'solutions' involve removing humans from the deck. We don't know how to portray ourselves without gender binary?
 

tarotlova

Twisted Tarot Tales?
 

prudence

True. But while this is an increasing trend in contemporary culture, it isn't the default, and I'm not arguing about that. The default position for the male is the Actor, the Agent, the Subject, while women are, 90% of the time the Object.

Even the female knight of wands is artfully arranged on a chair. I want Artemisia's Judith, hacking of her foe's head.
The Vacchetta queen of swords is depicted this way, though she's wearing a lovely dress while holding the severed head in her hand.