Hello, all! I have recently joined and I’m happy to be here. It’s my first forum ever lol
I have been working on plans for designing a Berserk tarot deck. There are a total of 78 cards consisting of 22 major arcana and 56 minor arcana cards. I am only focusing on the 22 major arcana cards for now. The major arcana follow the most important steps of “Fool’s Journey”. Considering the themes in Berserk, I thought this could be my version of Berserk art (i’m not the best artist… but i’m working on it). This involves rereading the manga a ton, index tabbing, grouping all the themes, parallels, extra tarot research, etc. The artwork for the tarot cards are very intentional and most if not all decks follow the original themes from the classic Rider-Waite deck. That’s usually the one people have seen if they’ve seen any tarot cards at all. The tarot is heavily inspired by religious themes, which I think work great for the subverted religious themes of the series. Artists definitely take creative liberties though. That’s where I have run into some roadblocks. Generally, every interpretation of the card is usually based on your immediate feelings and emotion that the card evokes, but to put it against a story has changed my ideas just a little. Every time I think I’ve finalized the idea for a design and put all the pieces together I’m like hmmmmmmm idk, and go back to the drawing board. I have jumped around on this forum before making an account and I thought this might be the place to discuss + get some other opinions/perspectives even if I end up going with my own design. I think it could be a fun discussion.
I’ll use the first card as an example:
The first card in the deck is the start of the journey and begins at 0 instead of 1, which starts at a total neutral position. It’s usually a call to adventure and the fool stands on the edge of a cliff ready to jump, act first and think later. There’s excitement in not knowing how the story ends. I like the quote “in a fight, they say The Fool is the strongest of them all”.
The motifs of this card usually include:
1. a fool, sometimes a jester, a step away from walking off the edge of a cliff
2. the fool carries a stick and bindle
3. something that illustrates innocence (in the classic deck, this is a white rose in the other hand. sometimes a white shirt)
4. a dog. i’ve seen in most cards that the dog is beside the fool, ready to jump with him. in less cases, i’ve seen the dog is biting the fools leg or clothes as if it is pulling the fool back from the cliff. in some cards there is no dog.
Another fun one that makes me think a lot:
The second card, card 1. The Magician.
In short, the card is about potential made real. You have the tools, now use them. In this card there is a table that holds four tools which are symbols. The tools make up the 4 suits for the rest of the 56 minor arcana cards and represent elementals: wands(fire), cups(water), swords(air), and pentacles(earth). Some of those were obvious to me like the magic fetishes Schierke gives the the black swordsman party. Obvious choices are air=Serpicos sylph sword and fire=Isidro’s salamander dagger. It’s not entirely clear to me what I’ll do for water and pentacles, but I have some ideas i just have to make sense of them.
Anyway, I’m sure this will take me forever . At least it will keep me busy.
I have been working on plans for designing a Berserk tarot deck. There are a total of 78 cards consisting of 22 major arcana and 56 minor arcana cards. I am only focusing on the 22 major arcana cards for now. The major arcana follow the most important steps of “Fool’s Journey”. Considering the themes in Berserk, I thought this could be my version of Berserk art (i’m not the best artist… but i’m working on it). This involves rereading the manga a ton, index tabbing, grouping all the themes, parallels, extra tarot research, etc. The artwork for the tarot cards are very intentional and most if not all decks follow the original themes from the classic Rider-Waite deck. That’s usually the one people have seen if they’ve seen any tarot cards at all. The tarot is heavily inspired by religious themes, which I think work great for the subverted religious themes of the series. Artists definitely take creative liberties though. That’s where I have run into some roadblocks. Generally, every interpretation of the card is usually based on your immediate feelings and emotion that the card evokes, but to put it against a story has changed my ideas just a little. Every time I think I’ve finalized the idea for a design and put all the pieces together I’m like hmmmmmmm idk, and go back to the drawing board. I have jumped around on this forum before making an account and I thought this might be the place to discuss + get some other opinions/perspectives even if I end up going with my own design. I think it could be a fun discussion.
I’ll use the first card as an example:
The first card in the deck is the start of the journey and begins at 0 instead of 1, which starts at a total neutral position. It’s usually a call to adventure and the fool stands on the edge of a cliff ready to jump, act first and think later. There’s excitement in not knowing how the story ends. I like the quote “in a fight, they say The Fool is the strongest of them all”.
The motifs of this card usually include:
1. a fool, sometimes a jester, a step away from walking off the edge of a cliff
2. the fool carries a stick and bindle
3. something that illustrates innocence (in the classic deck, this is a white rose in the other hand. sometimes a white shirt)
4. a dog. i’ve seen in most cards that the dog is beside the fool, ready to jump with him. in less cases, i’ve seen the dog is biting the fools leg or clothes as if it is pulling the fool back from the cliff. in some cards there is no dog.
Another fun one that makes me think a lot:
The second card, card 1. The Magician.
In short, the card is about potential made real. You have the tools, now use them. In this card there is a table that holds four tools which are symbols. The tools make up the 4 suits for the rest of the 56 minor arcana cards and represent elementals: wands(fire), cups(water), swords(air), and pentacles(earth). Some of those were obvious to me like the magic fetishes Schierke gives the the black swordsman party. Obvious choices are air=Serpicos sylph sword and fire=Isidro’s salamander dagger. It’s not entirely clear to me what I’ll do for water and pentacles, but I have some ideas i just have to make sense of them.
Anyway, I’m sure this will take me forever . At least it will keep me busy.
