Decks with women who aren't in floaty dresses.

Le Fanu

As I hunt through decks for women I can actually relate to, I'm find that I'm really very short of role models.
I would suspect that we all feel no deck, no image, truly fits us. You can attribute it to your own gender that you can't find yourself in the imagery but I (personally) honestly don't feel that males in tarot-land are male by my own identity or feeling of it. I've seen similar threads with people recommending male tarots, none of which reflect me. I think it's just symptomatic of our times, the complexity of identity, the multiplicity of identity that nothing really reflects us. I've given up expecting tarot to reflect me.

It's just this sort of everyman/woman otherland
 

euripides

Omegaland is a very quirky deck but there are no long flowing dresses.

Oh this is a really funky deck. I hadn't heard of it. Funny how sometimes questions like this do bring interesting decks out of the woodwork.

The Bonefire isn't for me, but is a great suggestion nonetheless.

I seem to recall that we've had some related discussions in the past where it's a case of the artists needing some kind of visual cue, and Tarot also draws on a lot of archetypes that you want to trigger.


It's just this sort of everyman/woman otherland

So true. I'm finding it very strange, lately. It's like: femininity = wearing a dress, or makeup, or long hair. Masculinity = beard, muscles. I know a lot of our ideas about gender stem from biological imperatives, and it can be hard to untangle these from the socially constructed ones. I feel weirdly trapped by them.

There's this element of the awareness of gaze: here I am, in my sensible shoes. Why should I feel *less* feminine in Doc Martins than in toe-crushing heels? I don't like lace and pink.

I've always been rather interested in Butler's ideas on performativity, but Ru Paul nails it: you're born naked, and the rest is drag.
 

page of ghosts

In the Tarot of the Cat People it is the other way around: almost all of the people in the deck - man, woman, androgynous looking people - are wearing long robes or dresses! The Dreaming Way has some women with short hair that is just about ear level and like others have said some people who look like either or neither gender. There are a lot of cool outfits in that deck in general. Dresses come in a lot of different lengths and everyone looks so stylish but also comfortable. The temperance card in the Halloween Tarot is one of my favourites because I feel like the little witch has an outfit I'd easily wear myself. I love her boots and the fact that she tied up her long dress to make it more practical (I assume).
 

Morwenna

It makes it hard when a deck creator is going for the timeless. Unless the deck has a specific theme, the default seems to be skirts on women simply because it has the weight of centuries in the Western world on its side. Once you put pants on women or cut their hair short, you're pinning them down to a specific time and place. Of course you're pinning them down to Western culture anyway, because some Eastern cultures have put women in pants. I suppose the only timeless garb for women is none at all.

But I like the point made about Cat People. That's a fantasy culture where both sexes wear long robes, and just about all the men have long hair (and mustaches), while some of the women have shorter hair.
 

prudence

Dear tarot designers,

Could we have some queens who wear trousers? Could we have some strong women who don't float about in floor-length gowns? Mothers are precious and wonderful, but that role isn't for everyone. And you know - some women have short hair.

I was watching Top Gun. I wanted to fly when I was a teenager. It dawned on me recently that I had the poster of Tom Cruise because I wanted not to date him, but to BE him. Not to be a man, but to do what he did and be as cool as him. Not the decorative girlfriend, not the ground-based expert in the tight skirt. To be Starbuck in the reimagined Battlestar.

I swear our stereotyping of the genders, for all the supposed embracing of diversity that we have now, has gotten far worse. I know that we need to value traditional women's roles and women's work. It's all about choice - those roles are so important.

As I hunt through decks for women I can actually relate to, I'm find that I'm really very short of role models.

I'm just happy when the women have clothes on......
I did nearly spit out my tea when I read your reply this morning, Metafizzypop! So true. I also appreciate it when the nude women don't look as if the artist was literally using a still shot from a porn, to draw our anatomy. A perfect, youthful breast doesn't actually look like a silicone one, there is no rim around the top of a natural breast. I'm mentioning youthful breasts specifically because so many times I've heard people (men and women) moan about not wanting to see old, sagging breasts, when it comes to tarot. And of course it's the young women depicted nude more often in decks anyway.

Euripides, I also think Dreaming Way would work for you, and it does read very well too. I've actually said I'd love it if some of the clothing shown in that deck was produced in real life. There are some really cool outfits in this deck. I'm like you in that I am much more comfortable in pants, shoes I can hike in, and clothes that aren't restricting in any way. I often feel like I'm in drag when I do need to wear a dress. Even when I was a young woman, sexy was never my aim.

I'll have to have a look at the Omegaland deck, it sounds interesting.
 

barefootlife

Nthing Slow Holler for images of all kinds of people with different shapes and genders and clothing styles. There's a lot of nudity (male and female) in Invisible Light, but also modern clothing (it's a photographic deck). All white folks though, with a lot of self-portraits of the photographer who made it. Still, I really like this deck.

A lot of the non-gender-performative decks are indies or small runs, for better or worse. The Little Red Tarot website might have some more ideas for you.
 

magicjack

You must be a king in disguise. The first image that came to mind is the knight of wands and the knight of swords in the Steampunk Tarot. I think it might be hard to find queens in pant suits..( Hillary Clinton wears pant suits ). I'm going with Steampunk Tarot like the other ones.

( I'm seeing a lot of female magician's lately). I've always thought the woman in the Robin Wood 2 of cups looks like a man. I think it's best to look at cards not so gender specific.
 

euripides

You must be a king in disguise.

Must I? You see, this is it. You must fit one box, or another. In disguise? Am I pretending to be someone I'm not?

The Slow Holler does look wonderful.

The Numinous looks amazing! I don't often like current 'arty' or expressive decks, as I often find the style of the art seems too 'naive' (I went to art school and did many hours of figure drawing, so I tend to be a bit fussy about figurative art). But the art in the Numinous is really interesting. Really unique characters.

There's a thing in storytelling and in art where you have to take care to distinguish between the cliche and the archetype. If you try to create a 'typical' person, you end up with a bland, generic collection of cliches. Basing your work on a real, three-dimensional and complex character, who doesn't always fit the stereotype, results in an infinitely more real character that, ironically, is somehow more relatable than the one that tries to be 'all things to all people'.
 

JMI_Tarot

There's a thing in storytelling and in art where you have to take care to distinguish between the cliche and the archetype. If you try to create a 'typical' person, you end up with a bland, generic collection of cliches. Basing your work on a real, three-dimensional and complex character, who doesn't always fit the stereotype, results in an infinitely more real character that, ironically, is somehow more relatable than the one that tries to be 'all things to all people'.

This explains so much about so many things. I think you are describing here exactly what makes life interesting, what makes people, art, tarot cards, everything, interesting.

With respect to your original question to designers of tarot cards, you are exactly right that bland archetypes, while they can make reading "easier" for some, probably don't address the glorious complexity of our lives.

I was worried when I was creating my deck that some of the people who appear on the cards are of a kind of, let's say questionable character and some people may not understand why I chose to put them on Tarot cards. But I was compelled to use them. It felt right.
 

CharlotteK

A perfect, youthful breast doesn't actually look like a silicone one, there is no rim around the top of a natural breast. I'm mentioning youthful breasts specifically because so many times I've heard people (men and women) moan about not wanting to see old, sagging breasts, when it comes to tarot. [\QUOTE]

This one looks like implants gone wrong... 😂😂😂😂



65463f9987ae7349f71874a8a4a65928.jpg