VISCONTI SFORZA HANDPAINTED DECK

91
Hello again,

I forgot to add that this handpainted deck (wonderfull work indeed) is for me a painted gift offered to a marriage and executed by an artist who was commissioned for this.
Experts demonstated that faces on cards are those of rich fellows in honour of them.

In my view, we are far from a symbolic object, an more close to a painting order.

Holes on top of each card could indicate that they were exposed like painting in Le Louvre but for decorating their Castle.

Unless of course that it was result of an intention to shows a card spread for interpretation :-\

Salutations

Yves Marseille
Personne n'est au dessus de l'obligation de dire la vérité.
Nobody is above obligation to tell truth.

Re: VISCONTI SFORZA HANDPAINTED DECK

92
Yves Le Marseillais wrote:Hello again,

I forgot to add that this handpainted deck (wonderfull work indeed) is for me a painted gift offered to a marriage and executed by an artist who was commissioned for this.
Experts demonstated that faces on cards are those of rich fellows in honour of them.

In my view, we are far from a symbolic object, an more close to a painting order.

Holes on top of each card could indicate that they were exposed like painting in Le Louvre but for decorating their Castle.

Unless of course that it was result of an intention to shows a card spread for interpretation :-\

Salutations

Yves Marseille
Hello all,

I just remenbered this morning that when I saw in Issy Les Moulienaux Museum/Paris the only original Visconti Sforza big card they own, I noticed (while I took picture of it) that this card is VERY thick: I estimate it 3 to 4 milimeters.

So... I think this full deck was really more a gifted painted present (for a marriage probably as all historians estimate) rather than a deck effectively aimed to be played with.
Unless this peole were Giants with adequate hands =))

This beeing said, I also remenber that some painting showed people playing cards with large size cards.
But what about thickness of cards ?

Pinning up cards to walls is another possibility for examinating a spread result with some confort regarding their famous size 175 mm x 87 mm and thickness: cardboard (carton épais) many layers (couches).

Regarding those found in a well of Sforza Castle we unfortunatly don't have an exact datation but XVI to XVII centuries; but we can see on some cards (Le Soleil and Le Monde), a Roman numerotation XVIIII and XXI.
Unnamed on the other hand.

My deep feeling is that original pattern of Tarot de Marseille let'say is made of this 3 elements Well Separeted: Number, Image, Name.

An this is also my Aestetical point of view of course.


Salutations,

Yves
Personne n'est au dessus de l'obligation de dire la vérité.
Nobody is above obligation to tell truth.

Re: NOBLET = VIEVILLE ?

93
If we take the Sforza Castle [SC] well World card as an exemplar of an early or proto-Tarot de Marseille (which of course it may not be), and also take into consideration that sheets such as the Cary Sheet, then it is more likely that early TdMs had no titles nor numbers.

I may be incorrect, but even the SC World card seems to my eyes to have had its number written on it after the card was made, rather than an intrinsic part of the woodblock. Not having seen the original, however, this may not be correct.

Still, I do take the point, with which I agree, that the Tarot de Marseille as later standardised includes ordinal number and title. Are these intrinsic to the Tarot de Marseille? In other words, would it still be a Tarot de Marseille if a deck was produced without title nor numeral? from my perspective, yes, though both title and numeral would be implied.

With regards to the Visconti cards, it may be that moisture absorption has over time increased its thickness. In any case, even if it did not, I do not see it as a problem for a game to be played.
Image
&
Image
association.tarotstudies.org

VISCONTI SFORZA HANDPAINTED DECK

94
jmd wrote:If we take the Sforza Castle [SC] well World card as an exemplar of an early or proto-Tarot de Marseille (which of course it may not be), and also take into consideration that sheets such as the Cary Sheet, then it is more likely that early TdMs had no titles nor numbers.

I may be incorrect, but even the SC World card seems to my eyes to have had its number written on it after the card was made, rather than an intrinsic part of the woodblock. Not having seen the original, however, this may not be correct.

Still, I do take the point, with which I agree, that the Tarot de Marseille as later standardised includes ordinal number and title. Are these intrinsic to the Tarot de Marseille? In other words, would it still be a Tarot de Marseille if a deck was produced without title nor numeral? from my perspective, yes, though both title and numeral would be implied.

With regards to the Visconti cards, it may be that moisture absorption has over time increased its thickness. In any case, even if it did not, I do not see it as a problem for a game to be played.

Hello Jean Michel and all,

Visconti Sforza card I saw was protected by a glass so I was not able to have it in hand. A deeper examination could solve question of thickness and moisture hypothesis for an increase of thickness.
Card face seems in pretty good healh and moisture would have attack both side of card too ?

Anyway on some painting players used wide cards. So OK for using high sized cards.
But such specific high quality cards would have been dommaged by playing action in my opinion.

About Sforza Castle World card (and Sun card) I agree with you that only a deeper examination of original could shows us if numbers were part of original engraving project.
I saw so different models and abnormal constructions in decks about names and numbers that for the moment I doubt on both possibilities.

More generaly, when I see a card who hide one part of the scene I have impression to look a landscape from a house and trough a window : Someting is missing. Do you have same impression ?

Best,

Yves
Personne n'est au dessus de l'obligation de dire la vérité.
Nobody is above obligation to tell truth.

Re: VISCONTI SFORZA HANDPAINTED DECK

95
Yves Le Marseillais wrote:[
More generaly, when I see a card who hide one part of the scene I have impression to look a landscape from a house and trough a window : Someting is missing. Do you have same impression ?
No. I get the feeling that someone has pulled the drapes over part of my scene, and covered up part of my view. I want to remove the drapes so that I can see the entire landscape. O:-)

Re: NOBLET = VIEVILLE ?

96
I suppose I was making my comment regarding the Visconti painted card based on a few hand-painted cards from the period that I have seen (and in some cases handled) - though many of these appear to form part of other sequences or sets, and are not, in my view, tarot (for example, there are some individual cards also found in, if I recall, the Museum of Mediæval Art in Paris, and card sets in the documents section of the British Museum).

These are all, it seems to me, able to be handled and played by its wealthy owners. The equivalent these days would be, I suppose, to assume that someone who owns an intact 1938 Talbot-Lago T150 (eg here) would never dare drive it on a busy road!

In terms of the analogy of looking through a window, I find ALL of the cards precisely as such, in the same manner that any photo taken from a holiday only captures a tiny (and instantaneous) fragment of a far broader scene, whether physical or, in the case of tarot, in part conceptual and, as Michael is apt to remind us, sequential.
Image
&
Image
association.tarotstudies.org

Re: NOBLET = VIEVILLE ?

97
Returning to the topic as its began,I think that Vieville deck is too much earlier than Noblet,or best said,it is based on a very older mould.

* If we see the XVII card only Vieville deck shows a bigger central star and only four little stars around it,as in the case of the Cary Sheet.
The Universe is like a Mamushka.

Re: Noblet = Vieville ?

98
EUGIM wrote:Returning to the topic as its began,I think that Vieville deck is too much earlier than Noblet,or best said,it is based on a very older mould.

* If we see the XVII card only Vieville deck shows a bigger central star and only four little stars around it,as in the case of the Cary Sheet.
You know, I was never really sure what the topic was when this began? What do you mean by Noblet = Vieville? Do you mean in age? If so, then yes, they are from around the same period, 1650=1660s. Or do you mean something else?

I think the Star is perhaps a bad example, surely when compared to the Cary Sheet, the general iconography is a match for the Tarot de Marseille with its nude waterbearer rather than the Astrologer on the Vieville? If anything, the Star on the Cary Sheet shows that some of the iconography of the Tarot de Marseille existed about 150 years before our oldest surviving Tarot de Marseille deck, the Jean Noblet.

Now personally, I've been trying to show that the Vieville, while not a Tarot de Marseille, contains details that I think probably existed on earlier Tarot de Marseille decks than those that have survived. I've pointed out the pips, and how they match cards found in the Sforza Castle that also do not have parts of the images replaced with numbers. I've pointed out the areas at the tops and bottoms of the Vieville (like on the chariot, and on Strength) which I think might show details that were lost on the Tarot de Marseille during what I believe was the process of adding titles and numbers.

I think the Vieville is a wonderful, special deck. And I do think that it harkens back to something earlier, and that there are mysteries in it that have yet to be solved.

Why does it have iconography from the "Bologna" tradition? How did it get into the Vieville and the Belgian Tarot?

Why does Vieville mix the Belgain Tarot and the Tarot de Marseille tarot?

Does he invent the Belgian? Or is he bringing an existing style into Paris?

Does he intend to suggest ethnicity with his courts?

Who was his market? Were parisians playing with this type of deck?

What is the relationship with the Vieville and Alciato's naming order? Does Vieville's sequence tell us something of his origin?

There are a ton more questions I'm sure, I don't have the deck in front of me at the moment, these are just off the top of my head.

So Eugim, what are you getting at? What's your point? What is this discussion to be about? I'll happily talk about the Vieville as much as anyone wants to! :D

Re: NOBLET = VIEVILLE ?

99
Robert:
The point is that only Vieville shows that pattern regarding the bigger central star and the four little stars around it as at the Cary Sheet.
So if we will not consider Vieville a Tarot de Marseille deck,may be we will consider it at least a proto-Tarot de Marseille.
It is a fact that is the more closest to the Cary Sheet about this card.
Isn it ?.
So older or based on an older deck.
So older than Noblet the truest first Tarot de Marseille as you pointed many times before.


;)
The Universe is like a Mamushka.

Re: Noblet = Vieville ?

100
EUGIM wrote:Robert:
The point is that only Vieville shows that pattern regarding the bigger central star and the four little stars around it as at the Cary Sheet.
So if we will not consider Vieville a Tarot de Marseille deck,may be we will consider it at least a proto-Tarot de Marseille.
It is a fact that is the more closest to the Cary Sheet about this card.
Isn it ?.
So older or based on an older deck.
So older than Noblet the truest first Tarot de Marseille as you pointed many times before.


;)
Well, I disagree with you about the star. It is interesting if the number and design matches the Vieville, but I really do think the critical item to consider with the Cary Sheet is that it matches the Tarot de Marseille.

I don't know that I would say that the Vieville is a proto-Tarot de Marseille, in fact, I am pretty sure I would not say that.

What I do think is that the maker of the Vieville copied parts of an earlier Tarot de Marseille deck, and so "accidently preserved" them so to speak. Just like I believe that Dodal copied an earlier version, and that Noblet copied and earlier version as well.

I'm honestly not sure about things, I'm still very much exploring and learning... but my basic feeling is that the Dodal is important because it is a direct copy, literally a copy from an earlier existing pattern, but modified for the titles and numbers, and unfortunately done in a rather sloppy fashion so the details are poor.

I think Noblet was also looking at this type of deck, but he completely redrew it from the start, rather than copied it.

I'm not sure what Vieville was looking at. It might have been a Tarot de Marseille similar to ones Dodal and Noblet used, or it might have been something closely related to it. If anything, I would guess it was an even older Tarot de Marseille model. Yet, he's got all of those cards that are clearly not a Tarot de Marseille, but are from Italian decks like the Bologna or maybe even the Minchiate.

Ross and Michael have suggested that Vieville might have something to do with the Piedmont area, as Dummett was stumped on why this region played with an order similar to Bologna. I think this is an incredibly interesting topic to explore, whether here or in another thread.

More later, now I have to go to school!