Another printing of the Alchemical by R Place

[FLizarraga]

Yes, me too. I want the book too and will get it later. For now, I am happy to get the deck.
The funding for this deck is going very well - 98% of the necessary funds are in after two days

Well, it's Robert Place we're talking about here...

 

[agviz]

I really wish he would do a straight up RWS clone. I love his style.

Brilliant!

Does anyone have the book? How accessible is it to someone who understands little of alchemy?

 

[Le Fanu]

mmm. I shall be the lone voice here. This is one edition too many. Enough.

And the Tarot of the Sevenfold Mystery is such a triumphant masterpiece - it sort of merged the best of the 3 (!) editions of the Alchemical and gave it a final sheen of something else entirely. I think that is his masterpiece. It feels odd now to step back or sideways and go back to it again.

I think the wonderful thing about Place's tarots is that he doesn't do a RWS. He creates depth in his own unique universe. No disrespect to anyone at all but to hear pleas for a RWS in 2015, I honestly thought we'd moved on and were now open to doing interesting things with tarot. I mean others can and will do it - let Llewellyn slip into their black hole - but Place is such a unique thinker, it'd be a shame if he did something so crowd-pleasing.

 

[Aeric]

Has Place ever indicated his preference for RWS? He seems to find ways to meld every possible subject matter with RWS, but has never tackled the context of the RWS itself as far as I know.

 

[Farzon]

mmm. I shall be the lone voice here. This is one edition too many. Enough.

And the Tarot of the Sevenfold Mystery is such a triumphant masterpiece - it sort of merged the best of the 3 (!) editions of the Alchemical and gave it a final sheen of something else entirely. I think that is his masterpiece. It feels odd now to step back or sideways and go back to it again.

I think the wonderful thing about Place's tarots is that he doesn't do a RWS. He creates depth in his own unique universe. No disrespect to anyone at all but to hear pleas for a RWS in 2015, I honestly thought we'd moved on and were now open to doing interesting things with tarot. I mean others can and will do it - let Llewellyn slip into their black hole - but Place is such a unique thinker, it'd be a shame if he did something so crowd-pleasing.

For my part, I'm happy about the new edition! Else I couldn't get this deck but by monitoring ebay regularly...

And I like the style. Looks old in a modern way....

I completely agree about your point about RWS though. There are so many RWS-clones out there and to just copy a deck that has already been thought through very well would be a waste of Place's talent. (The intellectual talent not the graphic) He couldn't even write a book about it!

 

[karen0205]

Brilliant!

Does anyone have the book? How accessible is it to someone who understands little of alchemy?

I have the Alchemical Tarot book. I'll get it out later and see
how much info is in it about alchemy.

 

[agviz]

...I think the wonderful thing about Place's tarots is that he doesn't do a RWS. He creates depth in his own unique universe. No disrespect to anyone at all but to hear pleas for a RWS in 2015, I honestly thought we'd moved on and were now open to doing interesting things with tarot. I mean others can and will do it - let Llewellyn slip into their black hole - but Place is such a unique thinker, it'd be a shame if he did something so crowd-pleasing.

I enjoy the sub-category of collecting RWS variations such as the Universal, Radiant, Illuminated, Albano, and so on. These are mostly coloring/drawing differences and I certainly would find Place's illustrative style fascinating here. But there is nothing to say that he couldn't do something more evocative and innovate. Illuminati is a recent example of such a RWS variation, which both you and I have taken to. Place knows so much about tarot that if he did create a RWS, my wild guess is that it would shine some fresh perspective on the deck.

 

[agviz]

I have the Alchemical Tarot book. I'll get it out later and see
how much info is in it about alchemy.

Thanks! I'm curious to hear if you find it stuffy or an easy read. Or just any take at all you have on it. Are there pretty pictures?

 

[Le Fanu]

Thanks! I'm curious to hear if you find it stuffy or an easy read. Or just any take at all you have on it. Are there pretty pictures?

oh no, not stuffy at all. It belongs to that category of decks/books/kits which I call (in my mental shorthand) watertight decks. The theory and content hold tight.

 

[Babalon Jones]

I got a print of Wheel of Fortune, the other card I like a lot. Death seemed a little morbid for the kitchen