December 17 - December 23, 2011 ~ The Kingdom Within

Kingdom Within Tarot
Juno Lucina, Shannon ThornFeather
(c) Schiffer, 2011

I purchased this deck from another member of Aeclectic Tarot.  After reading about it and looking at scans, I thought it really looked interesting.   Comments at Aeclectic range from one end of the spectrum to the other. 


The card stock is sturdy and glossy.  It is that nice stuff I like (except the gloss) like the 2nd Edition Bohemian Gothic and the Grail Tarot.  The size is fairly decent and I can hold the deck in my hand.  Because of the thickness of the card stock, it is a bit thick however.


The art is primitive in some cards and quite fine in others.  There is liberal use of colors as well.  Unfortunately, many of the cards are, well, cluttered.  There is so much on some cards that I found it difficult to focus on anything in the card.  In some cases, there is just so much stuffed onto the card that it begins to loose any sort of impact.  Perhaps, however,  this is more of an after effect of the minimalist PoMo?   But I think that the similarity of color in images and background is more of the issue for some cards.  I found it hard to discern some of the images.


It isn't that the deck is awful, so much.   The question seems to be whether I am willing to put the work in to it that it would require.   I am not sure that I am willing to do that.  This restored tree of life doesn't make a huge difference to me.  Definitely not enough to learn and study on it.   I have a very basic understanding of the traditional tree of life as it relates to tarot and it makes sense to me and this deck just confused me.


I believe it has merit and it has earned a spot in my Occult / Golden Dawn sub collection, but it may be some time before I work with it.


Rating:  Keeper -