Salvador Dalí's Tarot Deck

Apropos of a past post about my collection of Tarot cards here, I am excited that just yesterday, German art book publisher Taschen began selling Salvador Dalí's legendary Tarot deck.

Taschen says:
"Legend has it that when preparing props for the James Bond film Live and Let Die, producer Albert Broccoli commissioned Surrealist maestro Salvador Dalí to create a custom deck of tarot cards. Inspired by his wife Gala, who nurtured his interest in mysticism, Dalí eagerly got to work, and continued the project of his own accord when the contractual deal fell through.

The work was published in a limited art edition in 1984 that has since long sold out, making Dalí the first renowned painter to create a completely new set of cards. Drawing on Western masterpieces from antiquity to modernity (including some of his own), Dalí seamlessly combined his knowledge of the arcane with his unmistakable wit. The result is a surreal kaleidoscope of European art history."

Along with the cards themselves (in both Spanish and English, of course), Taschen includes a booklet by renowned German tarot author Johannes Fiebig which features an introduction to Dalí’s life and the project’s making-of, a comprehensive explanation of each card’s composition and its meaning, and step-by-step instructions on how to perform readings.

https://www.taschen.com/pages/en/catalogue/art/all/44640/facts.dali_tarot.htm

"CCCP: Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed"

Apropos of my April post about photographer Jan Kempenaers book of photos of 1960s and 70s war monuments in ex-Yugoslavia (if you missed it, you can see the post here), I present "CCCP: Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed," a book by French photographer Frédéric Chaubin, published by the venerable art book outfit Taschen. Chaubin's book explores similar territory as Kempenaers' does, but instead of being neglected and forgotten war monuments, these are actual buildings that were (and presumably still are) used as civic structures. And whereas the former Yugoslavia monuments are from the 60s and 70s, these Soviet buildings were constructed between 1970 and 1990, the last twenty, dwindling years of the Soviet regime.

From the Taschen website:
"Photographer Frédéric Chaubin reveals 90 buildings sited in fourteen former Soviet Republics which express what he considers to be the fourth age of Soviet architecture. His poetic pictures reveal an unexpected rebirth of imagination, an unknown burgeoning that took place from 1970 until 1990. Contrary to the 1920s and 1950s, no “school” or main trend emerges here. These buildings represent a chaotic impulse brought about by a decaying system. Their diversity announced the end of the Soviet Union."

Druzhba Sanatorium in Yalta, Ukraine

Institute of Robotics and Technical Cybernetics

Palace of Ceremonies

The architecture facility at the Polytechnic Institute of Minsk

The Georgian Ministry of Highways in Tbilisi, Georgia

Ukrainian Institute of Scientific and Technological Research and Development

http://www.taschen.com/CCCP