Kadar from the Horses mouth.
Hello fellow travellers.
As the creator of the Kadar Deck I thought I would say a little about this project and make myself available for any questions you may have.
We have just over a week (less when you read this!) to get this deck funded, so my heart is living in my mouth at the moment. As this is a totally unique deck I genuinely think that it will be of interest to you here. Also, I think that when you see the examples on the Kickstarter site, I hope that you will agree that it would be a great shame if this did not materialize and be made available to the Tarot collector and working reader.
A little history on the Deck.
I have had a lifetime interest in the tarot and have been studying its symbolism for 40 years now. However, I also earn a living as a stage magician. So the Kadar deck was originally aimed at performers as a pocket sized reading system. This was called Zoltar after the fortune telling cabinet famous for its appearance in the film 'Big'. The aim was to have a Zoltar cabinet that you could put into your pocket or purse. This proved to be immensely popular and proved an effective introduction to genuine reading for many magicians.
The Zoltar card was marketed as a 'trick' rather than as a genuine reading tool. However, a strange thing started to happen, people started using it for genuine readings. It actually worked! The follow up; Kadar was a rather expensive box set aimed at the professional reader, I abandoned magic altogether and concentrated on making it work as a pure reading device. Again this proved very popular with the working reader, as it was bright, colourful, and had all of the associations with carnivals and funfairs. However there were three other factor that were the root of it's popularity. First is is a very easy system to learn. Secondly, it rarely fails you, it is very hard to misread - for reasons that I will make known should you be interested. Thirdly, it is relentlessly positive. Now I have a personal gripe with the practice of reinterpreting certain cards - such as death and the devil in the tarot, just to make them more palatable in a reading. In fact I have a gripe with any modern re(miss)interpretation. There are no death, or devils in the Kadar system, in fact there is no acceptance of negative energy. It seems playful and light - something that it fun and indeed it is. However, there is a coherent system underpinning it which gives Kadar real depth. Because of these factors and the visual draw that the Kadar set has in the working environment, it is gratifying to know that professional readers are using this set all over the world now. Although it is sold carefully to working professionals and was never intended to be mass market.
All of these qualities have made their way into the Kadar 'fortune telling cards'. These cards are a homage to my Great Aunt Ruth, who was a professional reader and claimed to be of genuine romany stock (the flame red hair, convinced me that she was telling the truth!). Without her, I would have never embarked upon the path I am now on.
The cards aim to invoke the old 'fortune telling' decks that were popular when I was a child. Like many genuine romany fortune tellers, I doubt that my Aunt Ruth had ever even seen a deck of Tarot cards, she read exclusively with ordinary playing cards. So the Kadar deck is based upon playing cards, not the tarot (I have a more esoteric reason for jettisoning the major arcana!). they are made for both the casual and the professional reader as well as for individual exploration.
The context of a Kadar reading is a 'game', it is play, it is intended to be fun. But as the reading progresses the true depth of the cards are revealed and the reading can be taken as deep as you and the sitter require.
So I hope that some of you good people will get behind this project, I assure you that you will not be disappointed in the end result.
I fear that I may have already taken up too much of your time, so if you have any questions or want any more details on this project, please do ask.