Feedback for card design

[Lolita Penguin]

Hello everyone,

I am making minimalist decks (only with the major arcana) and see if they can be used for reading. I am attempting to question the limits of what a tarot card is.
Anyways I post here a link to one that I finished today, I am also planning on making a explanatory booklet to go with the cards but so far I would prefer you to see them as they are and see if it is possible to work out the system.

http://lolitadopesodiogo.wordpress.com/2011/04/27/another-tarot-of-colours/

(the last image is the back of the cards)


Thank you for your time.

Lolita

 

[Debra]

Is Colour Enough to Make a Tarot Card?

I think, no. One could "read" such cards--people read all kinds of things. That doesn't make them tarot.

Your own cards have numbers in addition to colour, right? The number might evoke all that goes with a card for an experienced tarot lover. I can't see how the colors would speak to tarot without the explanation. If it requires an explanation to be seen as tarot by someone who knows tarot--if you remove the numbers and hand me a magenta card--I might see a color sample, but not tarot.

eta: It sounds like you've got a system for deciding which color is which card. I haven't a clue where to even begin deciphering it. The problem is, what would be a motivation to try? Modern tarot does use color symbolism quite a lot and I can see the appeal of working out why some skies are gray and others yellow in the Rider Waite, for example. A simple block of color isn't interesting enough in and of itself to make me wonder for more than a few seconds why it might be the "right" color for a particular card. Then I have to think, Should I work to decipher Lolita's idea? And then the question would be, why? On the other hand, if you give the explanations in a booklet, you're relying on words to do the work of images.

 

[merissa_88]

I know it's not very traditional. but I think it's an interesting idea.

 

[GryffinSong]

It wouldn't work for me at all. I love imagery. I want to see the artist's brush stroke, see their concepts, and interpret it in my own way. Color alone does nothing for me. It's all about context. I'm an artist, but I want something to work with. Otherwise I might as well go to Home Depot and look at paint chips.

Sorry.

 

[KMilliron]

It wouldn't work for me at all. I love imagery. I want to see the artist's brush stroke, see their concepts, and interpret it in my own way. Color alone does nothing for me. It's all about context. I'm an artist, but I want something to work with. Otherwise I might as well go to Home Depot and look at paint chips.

Sorry.

I'm NOT being sarcastic, but now I actually want to get some paint chips and use them as tarot cards. I'd draw on them or write on them of course. ^^

But I think color is enough. Is one color? No. Try and use a mixture of colors. Sure black could be death, but with a small light blue, off center, dot that has a small outer glow would make more sense to me.

 

[Amanda]

Some of the colors you used just don't make sense to me. I would expect Judgement to be of an orange nature, for example.

I could probably use this, and well (aside from a few color changes) but, I could probably make one myself by going down the paint aisle at Wal-Mart and collecting samples of paint colors.

 

[linnie]

Sorry... I'm into images more, too... I don't get any visual prompt from the colours, and some are very similar... Adding numbers (which I can see on th images, but am not sure if they relate to the cards) might help, but i peronally need images... Sorry to seem so unsupportive... It's great that you are thinking outside the box, so to speak... Best wishes ...

 

[Lolita Penguin]

thanks everyone for your feedback, I will definitely include it all in my project.

When I started working on this deck I went through several trials. I first started by choosing THE COLOUR that would suit best each card. But then I found out that all these colours worked individually for each card but not really as a whole. I was loosing the tarot as a system and treating each card independently of the others (which I think was not the right thing to do).

So then I looked into colour in every culture, for example in the american one. I wanted to have some sort of guidelines, or restrictions, and I thought that this would also fulfil my need for a system. But I could not find a colour for every cards.

Finally, I went more mathematical. I used Camoin's diagram as a grid and CMYK values to indicate the place of each card in this grid. That's what I posted earlier, and the most satisfying result so far (to me). But then when I come to look at the artwork I am not sure wether they are tarot card and have enough interpretational values or if they end up being colour samples. I aslo like that tension and the fact that it tackles the limit of interpretations.

Anyways here are two links to image of my previous experiments

http://lolitadopesodiogo.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/ex1.jpg

http://lolitadopesodiogo.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/ex2.jpg

they are not the clearest images ever but you can see the different decks.

 

[Lolita Penguin]

I am also working on typographic tarots, below is a link to the first one I finished (I am only talking about choosing the words).

http://lolitadopesodiogo.wordpress.com/2011/04/29/allegories/

If anyone could have a quick look and tell me what they think it would be much appreciated. The words that I chose are only my own personal view of the cards and I will be more than happy if anyone wants to discuss them.

thanks again

 

[jema]

Sorry but none of these works for me. I love tarot cause I love the way the images speak to me and my subconscious. There are nothing to hang my imagination up on here.