My friend enjoys to make comparisons of cards. She has a wonderful memory for the images in her deck collection and will find similar cards from a variety of packs to contrast and compare. Since I got The Vampire Tarot by Hertz yesterday, the Queen of Wands really niggled me. I knew I had seen her somewhere before and couldn't think where. And this evening, it dawned on me, so I pulled out the recent publication, The Heart of Faerie Oracle by Brian Froud. Yep, I was right. These cards can not just be coincidentally alike. One has been the inspiration for the other.
But which came first? Even though The Vampire Tarot was published in 2000 and the faerie deck only came out last year, my money is on Froud's being the original. I say this because Hertz already paid homage to his Death card by painting a version for her own faerie deck. She also did the same with Froud's Fairy Godmother. To my knowledge, a lot of the paintings that Froud used for his two decks were painted long before the idea of the pack was born, so my money is on Hertz already having seen this particular one and then painting a version for her tarot.
Illustrations from The Vampire Tarot by Nathalie Hertz and The Heart of Faerie Oracle by Brian Froud
The Fairy Godmother card is one of my all time favorite cards out of any deck. She just has the most amazing energy and I am always excited when she appears in a reading.
ReplyDeleteIts interesting that this person chose to use Brian Frouds images as inspiration in such a direct way. Its kind of fascinating to see how they look with more of a gothic vibe to them.
I think the Fairy Godmother is a beautiful card too; even though I confess to never really connecting with the Faeries Oracle. I am not so keen on Hertz's version of the card. It seems to lose the magic of Froud's original.
ReplyDeleteI also find it interesting (or strange, maybe) that the artist has decided to use the images so literally and blatantly. It is nice to see them in such a different style (and I like the tattoos on the Queen of Wand's back a lot), but I find it kind of odd that she has chosen to 'copy' from the same field of interest. I wonder how Froud feels about this. I guess it is no different to the thousands of direct copys/clones of the Rider Waite Smith and Pamela Coleman Smith's original paintings.