If you are a visual person, your love for divination and love of art make can have a happy marriage in tarot or oracle cards. In picking a deck, you can feel drawn to the art work or drawn the subject depicted in the art. Maybe you like animals or fantasy creatures, fairies or angels. Or maybe you like a particular style of art, use of imagery, or color spectrum. Halloween imagery is perfect for divination cards and we’ll look at two different decks: The Halloween Oracle by Stacey Demarco and The Halloween Tarot by Kipling West. These are not, by any means, the only decks available. A quick internet search will unveil many other decks, from the big publishing houses to independent artists. Explore and see what resonates with you!
To start, what are the differences? The easiest summary is that oracle cards are somewhat more fluid and there is a broader range of reference whereas tarot is a much more “fixed system.” Some describe tarot cards as the pages in a book and oracle cards as the chapters. A one-card concept with an oracle deck might be more specifically elaborated upon with a tarot card spread, whose archetypical images have a semi-traceable historical line of reference to mythological, astrological, and numeric symbolism. Its division between Major and Minor arcana can hold together a linear storyline whose characters and symbols can create a somewhat more uniform interpretation. Oracle cards can use any subject matter, imagery, or form of storytelling or tools of reflection to present a more fluid interpretation, more like a dream as opposed to a prescription.
That being said, is one better than the other? Absolutely not! Many card enthusiasts own decks of both varieties and some readers will even use them as a combination during the same reading.
So let’s play!
The Halloween Oracle is a 36 card deck with artwork done by Jim Manton and published by Blue Angel Publishing. Its images cover traditional Halloween themes from black cats and cauldrons, to skulls and Mexican Day of the Dead concepts along with more folk-based ideas such as barmbrack, a bread with objects baked into it as sort of fortune cookie. The book that comes along with it is thorough but not overwhelming in detail.
Each card’s imagery is described and given some historical context or mythological background, and then a meaning that might cover both sides of a message, the positive and negative, the light and the dark. Some oracle deck instructions will give you a specific, reversed meaning (meaning, when the card comes out of the deck upside down as read by the querent); others just give you both sides of the story to consider. The cards are large which allow you to enjoy the artwork without straining your eyes and the artwork itself is both incredibly clear and straightforward without losing any elegance.
The Halloween Tarot is authored by Karin Lee, illustrated by Kipling West, and is published by U.S. Games Systems. If you enjoy whimsical and folk-style art along with your normal Halloween faire, be prepared to have your striped socks charmed right off your ruby-slippered feet!
As stated earlier, the tarot has set number of cards (78) and follows a system of Major and Minor arcana, which form the framework of a storyline with obstacles and details that serve as the messages in your reading.
The history of tarot and the comparison of tarot suits (found in the Minor arcana) to playing card suits has as many different versions as it does authors who have written about the subject.
I leave it you, good reader, to conduct your historical research with openness and discretion. What we will say in regards to this deck is that the traditional suits of the tarot have been shifted to match our Halloween theme:
Pentacles = Pumpkins
Cups = Ghosts
Swords = Bats
Wands = Imps
This deck is published in a few different formats, some including things like a storage tin, others including a more detailed booklet and/or foldable card layout pattern.
There is also a deck of playing cards with the artwork of this deck which would also make a nice gift.
The images and patterns, like most tarot, are rooted in the traditional Rider-Waite system of imagery and symbolism, so those with a running familiarity with tarot will have fun comparing the two different styles. Those who are brand new to tarot will still be able to enjoy this deck and the playful associations may actually serve as a valuable learning tool as they explore tarot as a whole. The artwork is whimsical and fun, but doesn’t shy away from the darker and more serious nature of some of the card meanings.
For example, the Devil:
While the deck’s curious black cat (who appears on every card in the deck as part of your journey) looks on, the image is not drawn to frighten you, but beyond the smile of the devil and her playful blue dress (get it?), the message of breaking free from the things that might be enslaving you is still clear.
On the other hand, the Death card, stereotypically used to frighten in popular media, is drawn to cheer and encourage the idea that death simply means change. A smiling skeleton is watering pumpkins so that they can grow and change into jack o’ lanterns while other images depict aspects of death as a cyclical metamorphosis, not a tragic ending. All the while, our black cat friend gets a little head rub on the skeleton’s leg because cats.
Halloween is both a sacred and fun holiday for many, a time to honor the end of a season and prepare for the coming winter; a time to honor passed loved ones and a chance to communicate with them while the veil between worlds is thin. The recently passed can travel through and move on. It is simultaneously a time to remember and a time to let go.
These cards are beautiful pieces of artwork and art can help us appreciate all angles of the holiday, the sadness and the joy; the delicious and spine tingling sense of spookiness and play; and the cumulative memories that make this holiday and season a favorite for many people.
Happy reading and Happy Halloween!
