A Card Deck Stacked in Favor of Queerness

Pur·suit by Naima Green is a deck of 54 playing cards featuring queer womxn, trans, non-binary, and gender nonconforming people. The project, which “helps complete an image of the world that we live in,” says Green on her successful Kickstarter page, is in the interest of of groups, such as those pictured on the cards, that continue to be marginalized and unseen.

The cards, she says, can be used for “games, as guides, for divination, or whatever else you dream up.”

The project was conceived when Green stumbled upon Catherine Opie’s Dyke Deck at the New York Public Library while doing research for her MFA thesis. Dyke Deck is a set of poker cards that playfully looks at 90s era lesbians in California. With Opie’s blessing, Green “embarked on reimagining the Dyke Deck into a 2018 East Coast experience,” she says.

A celebration of all queer communities, with Pur·suit Green also wanted to reflect her own queer community, comprised mostly of women of color, and how their “experiences are (or most often are not) represented.”

Green, who lives in Brooklyn, feels fortunate to see queer families and partnerships on a daily basis. She acknowledges her neighborhood is an oasis from less diverse, accepting communities and hopes the cards in Pur·suit can serve as a type of refuge for all who use them. The cards also aim to act as a testimony to the existence of queer people and all the experiences, complexities, playfulness and love they embody.

Pur·suit
By Naima Green
Deck of playing cards with 54 photographs in an embossed box
3.5 x 2.5 in (8.9 x 6.4 cm)
Edition of 2,500