Greg Traw’s Dracxiodos Tarot is a psychedelic experience in a box, and if ever there was a chaos magician’s deck, this would be it. What’s more, Dracxiodos Tarot presents that chaos magician as, first and foremost, the Artist. The only Major Arcanum card to be titled, in fact, is the Artist card, assigned to Key V, classically the Hierophant.
The deck is independently produced and can be purchased directly from the artist here.
Reinforcing that theme of magician/alchemist as artist, the card back design features in the foreground an illustrator’s stylus pen and a paintbrush. Up top, in between the book pages featuring heiroglyphs is a razor blade pen, which I presume was Traw’s instrument of choice in the hand-cut collage works that this deck is comprised of.
By the way, the cards are huge! Above to the right is a deck at standard tarot size, 2.75″ x 4.75″. The Dracxiodos Tarot is 4″ x 8″. It’s a sturdy deck, too, 350 gsm white core cardstock with a matte finish.
The limited edition deck comes in a two-piece keepsake box and has been finished with this really incredible silver holographic edging that reminds me of labradorite.
Above in the bottom row, second card from the left with the pale green background, is Key V, renamed to The Artist. Every aspect of how this deck has been produced is in itself expressive of where contemporary art is today, and who the contemporary artist is. You’re going to see a global, culturally diverse influence. The point of view and visions are dynamic. Parts of Traw’s work are self-referential. These images are at once full of realism and surrealism.
benebell wen 