Joseph Glanz & Albert Berger (Austria) released “Tarock No.1″ deck (54 cards) in 1906. The cards were printed by Berger and then varnished, cut, collated and packaged by Josef Glanz. The printing process involved repeating the square grid on both the back and face sides of the cards, then the imagery on the face side was overprinted.
The deck was designed by Ditha Moser in Jugenstil style – the German equivalent of Art Nouveau with its preference for straight lines and simple forms in the shapes of squares, rectangles, circles and parallel lines. Proceeds from the sale of this Tarot deck were presumably intended to benefit a Viennese orphanage at Christmas time.
The Austrian playing card company Piatnik printed on its basis a bridge set “Jugendstil Art Nouveau” No.2136 in 1980. Both decks (blue and red backs) consist of 52 playing cards and 3 Jokers.
PLAYING CARDS + ART = COLLECTING 