The Älvdansen Tarot by Araminta and Midjourney AI is a deck created from connection to the Swedish elves (älvar), which is fitting since the artwork and some of the guidebook text are AI-generated, and both elves and AI can be simultaneously beautiful and terrifying. In this way, they are sublime, and that’s always a good place from which to assess our humanity and the parts of us that transcend the mortal shell.

I don’t love AI creations generally, but it takes a very talented design engineer to make something as beautiful as the images in this deck. (If you’ve used an AI art generator casually, you know those faces are often so inhuman that you’ve probably left the uncanny valley.) And it’s not easy. Araminta has explained that it took more than 3500 image generations to find what worked for these 78 cards.

But the deck brings in an otherworldly human-ish-ness that’s really stunning and evocative, as amplified through the lens of my deck interview. Also, just from the visuals, there’s a Scandi aesthetic that was a large part of the inspiration for what we in the states think of as mid-century modernism (Japan is the other half). Araminta has explained that a portion of the prompt for these cards involves “60s advertising,” which is probably where that comes from. It’s via via via.

As a distant Swede by ancestry and a magical ancestor worker, I expected that this deck should be very fun to play with from a visual-magical perspective. The cards themselves tell a more profound story. For deck interviews, I use my own custom deck interview spread, which you can read about in another blog post.

Deck Interview with the *Älvdansen Tarot*

**What major lesson are you here to help me learn?** *The Moon*
**Through which divine energy can we best communicate?** *The Wheel*
**In what area can you aid me to help others?** *Knight of Swords*
**In what area could your guidance be easily misunderstood?** *Queen of Wands*
**What can I do to keep our communication clear?** *Queen of Cups*
**How can I use your guidance for the highest good?** *Page of Cups*
**How will I know when we’re ready for a new lesson?** *Knight of Cups*

The overriding feel of this deck interview is a reminder of the power of what is unknown within us. Although featuring a vintage aesthetic and created with the latest AI art-rendering technology, the deck calls up the timelessness of our spiritual selves. As a divinatory tool created by connecting with the elves of Sweden (älvar), the Älvdansen Tarot can be as timeless as it is contemporary and retro. Within the strange, not-quite-human figures of the court (a statistically improbable 5 of 7 cards) rest the blurred faces of other selves not trapped in the time-bound reality in which the rest of us functions.

As a psychopomp, I work with the irrational and unseen world of lives seemingly lost to us in our current moment: past lives, ancestors, and the complex amalgam of memories and fantasies that is the inner child. But these lives that are ours but not solely ours can be accessed. They persist through strange and sometimes incomprehensible connections in our blood, in our minds, and in the magical ether around us. For me, I access these through the River of Time, and I use cards to help clarify the ideas for others. But there’s something about this deck that suggests it might be a viable and valuable tool in that work.

The deck interview begins with two major arcana: the Moon and the Wheel, both symbols of ancestral and past life work in their own ways.

The Moon card imagery itself is beautiful and a soothing dissolution of reality, but it obscures the full picture, as the Moon so often does. The Moon is the guiding light in the darkness that lets you release your grip on reality in order to experience what can’t be understood by the rationale mind. But the shift out of reality can be distorting. It reveals other worlds and other possibilities—whether they are real or fantasy is for you to determine. If you need convincing, just look at your lover’s face in moonlight: you’ll often see the hint of someone else. Have you caught your own reflection in moonlight? It can be terrifying to see the hint of someone else there. But you may also glimpse a past life. The Moon is powerful, but its light is not direct. It’s not even really its own. Moonlight is not really moonlight—it’s distorted sunlight. And that’s an important lesson to keep in mind. In the irrational and unknown and unseen, much is possible. But nothing is certain. Watch your step as you walk the path of moonlight.

The same warning applies to walking a path lighted by fairy (or elf) lights.

The Wheel of Fortune can signal karma, of past lives and ancestors and even future lives. But in this image, the Wheel floats in the sky above a pool of water—perhaps the shoreline of the River of Time—and a witch’s sigil rests in its center, recalling my own magic and the runes of my ancestors. A figure stands before the Wheel, a witch or fate-weaver casting the sigil (or the seiðr with their runes) to examine the threads that guide our fortunes and explore how they might be shifted and twisted to meet our own ambitions. In its totality, this looks like a card of reverence for the systems in which I have imbued magical power in my own practice.

However, it’s worth reminding myself that this deck is also modern and rooted in modern technology. And as I was shuffling the cards, I wondered if I should use a random number generator to choose a card for each position instead. (If you’re horrified by this ideas, I strongly recommend you try my Tarot Overload challenge. It has been eye-opening for many of us!) So when I saw the Wheel pop out for this second position, I thought of it as confirmation of my inkling to consider the randomness of chance as well as these bigger concepts of fate-weaving.

For the remaining cards, I see their primary purpose as centering the otherworldly humanity of the deck. It is yet is not of human creation. And as such, it’s a reminder that we have all of these different personas living within us. (I see, read, and teach the court cards as personas that we can awaken within us.) They are like people but not actual people. Just like our other lives are like our lives but not actually our lives. They swim into our psyche when the boundaries are blurry (remember the Moon?) or when we call them into us, when we intentionally connect. Otherwise, they’re there, just waiting.

In terms of how the remaining cards function in the reading, they’re a reminder of the intangibility of the kind of work I would do with this deck. The Knight of Swords is not impetuous and rash in this deck but curious, a strange child ready to try on a million different ideas, all at the same time. But this exploration is untethered. If I try to control it through the Queen of Wands, it’s not going to work out. Instead, the Queen of Cups flows in and out of the space, absorbing and dissipating. That’s because it’s all about the exploration of the fluid space, per the Page of Cups. And from there, something new can be created toward my own spiritual quest.

The Älvdansen Tarot is available for purchase through the Älvdansen website. I was provided with a stamped promotional not-for-resale copy of the deck to play with and see what I thought. I’m sharing that here honestly.

Deck Interview: Älvdansen Tarot