It's definitely a balancing act, trying to keep traditional and more modern symbolism for both the tarot and the theme. You either have to make changes and try to keep the symbolism in as a variation or in a different form or put a more modern figure in a archaic setting. We've decided to go with the former. Looking at the history of The Chariot, various creatures have been depicted pulling it, when they are depicted, which is not always. Even in RW clones, there are variations, and some times the sphinxes are left out completely, just showing a close up of the chariot and charioteer.
It's kind of hard to convey the triumph inherent in the card if your automobile needs to be pulled by anything (being light hearted, not snarky
). What we have done is change the design from sphinxes (ours are hawk headed) pulling the chariot to being supporters of the design, so that we keep them in a modified form.
The automobile we chose is the deuce coupe, THE hot rod. It's an excellent choice for a modern chariot as these cars were not merely fast cars, they were stripped down, modified and rebuilt to the will and knowledge of the driver. And driving high performance racing cars is an act of mastery.
The auxiliary gas tank does look a little steam punk, but it's a real and functional hot rod accessory. We are trying to make the entire project appeal to a broad range of people and interests. One of the nice aspects of "psychobilly" is that being strongly influenced by 50's pop culture (horror, hot rods, pin ups, and rockabilly/rock and roll, to name a few aspects) it touches lot of interests.
Not all of the symbology that we've kept is in the main part of the design either. The eight pointed star is now by the number. The wings surmounting the disk of Horus and the lingam and yoni are now present, in a modified form, by the winged tire. We even kind of doubled down on the lingam and yoni by piercing that element with a hoop. As a water aligned card, there is a wave in the back ground. the wave is easier to see in the Death design, but it's in both.