proper moth
A deck of german-suited playing cards produced midwar by Speilkartenfabrik Altenburg (A major playing card company which still survives and produces playing cards as ASS Altenburger today). Each card holds a caption and imagery related to the war and leaders.
This deck is one of my favorite pieces because I feel the images captures a lot of character of the period and some sentiment of the war. It conjures a lot of thought about who these would be for (who’d buy them, and who’d use them and when). There’s many locations and nationalities bringing in the idea that “we” are in a new global, industrial war, being led by strong, capable leaders in different areas of society. It emphasizes unity in war between the different regions of Germany. There’s the juxtaposition of these new developments on a traditional style suite with old heraldry. There’s also the meta juxtaposition of seeing these contrast with the realities of the time, and outcome.
The deck reveals some of the extent of how pervasive the war was in societal consciousness, that even playing cards are joining in for the war effort.
I found them at a card booth at a convention a few years back. I like playing cards, there's something rich about them, and I've always had a great interest in the WWI period.
Couple more images
boreal karma
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south orchid
gusty zenith
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sweet cliff
