TAROT OF REFLECTIONS – A Tarot Deck Designed by Cartoonist/Artist,
Francesco Ciampi – ISBN 073870791-0, Published by Lo Scarabeo, Torino

As a Tarot reader, when I first read "Tarot Reflections" deck, new to me, I noticed the very catchy and unique artwork. There are so many new decks on the market today, much more than in past years, and it seems to me the artwork has become a major deal. Some deck designers seem to take liberty with the standard Wait Tarot in an attempt to out-design the latest deck on the market -and this deck is no exception. However, the artwork of “Tarot of Reflections” is quite attractive with the wonderful and consistent Batik-styled background overlaid with the imagery of each card.

It’s interesting when I work with the various cards in this deck, how much they remind me of cartoons with their bright colors, hard edges and sour faces depicting sadness, meanness, or surprise. The creative concept of reflections showing mirrored images is very clever and well done. Most of the human characters are brutal, severe, edgy and sport tattoos, colored hair and complete        themselves with required dramatic physical expression. I have worked with this hybrid deck to see if it would be a fit for me and it is not. But to be very fair it could be ideal for the younger, new Tarot audience; if not for the person who has the ideal vibe for the ‘cartoonistic genre’.  (Card samples above at right.)

“Reflections” has a lot of good qualities. One of those qualities is that this is not a fluffy deck without any depth. Depth is not an issue for the arcanas. It’s obvious to me that the designer was intentional in provoking the meaning of each card through his art and as an artist myself - I respect that. Another quality about this deck that I like, is that it certainly does remind one ‘as a stone thrown into a pool creates waves, we also cast reflections that break up and return to us.’ How fun is that! An interactive Tarot Deck! (Who knew?)

The new-to-Tarot person might get a kick out of these cards and some of us stuffed shirts might loosen up. After all, the world is evolving and so is Tarot art. This deck takes some liberties with the Wait style such as the Major Arcana - III Empress, who sits beautifully upon her thrown in the appropriate coloring, green for harvest; but there is no pregnancy indicated. She is bone thin. And she is beautiful, of course. This is indicative of most of the deck’s promotion of thin beauty, but there are some missed opportunities. While the Major Arcana “High Priestess” is probably one of the most beautiful cards in the deck, it misses the chance to include the elements of light and dark in its background that I find very meaningful and intuitive.

The Major Arcana “Devil” scares the bejeebers
out of me when I look at it too long, so I don’t!  (Card too scary to show here. ;-)
And the Major Arcana “Star”, while gorgeous, lacks the message of hopeful stars shining above while contributing water to the grass and the river. Ah, but I fell in love with the adorable “2 of Pentacles”, whose wonderful facial expression speaks volumes of today’s world -
  "Taking from Peter to pay Paul”!
The “Tarot of Reflections” will surely delight the younger Taroists who can relate to the tattoos, piercings and colored hair with comic book edginess. But also to the open mind of the more reserved Tarot deck collectors and users. This is a deck worth a try; it will offer an entertaining exercise to an otherwise routine Tarot reading. Routine is not a word to use when describing Lo Scarabeo’s “Tarot of Reflections” by the delightfully clever artist, Francesco Ciampi!
What do they say?....... “The old continues to renew itself in new dress?” Hmmm

Review by Kristin Lee-Gray, CTI - Certified Tarot Master and Instructor,
President, CTN - Canadian Tarot Network, Intl. www.tarotcanada.com

Francesco Ciampi