April 2

Today performances of the St Matthew Passion in corona times were a topic in the news here. I'm not a big opera fan, but it reminded me of a Swiss deck. The sheet was easily found, so here's another opera composer, Richard Wagner. A somewhat controversial composer, but the deck with characters from 4 of his operas is beautifully illustrated. It was originally designed by Melchior Annen, a Swiss artist, for Müller &Co. in 1920, but was somehow never published until 1968. The operas are The Flying Dutchman (spades), Lohengrin (hearts), the Mastersingers (clubs) and Tannhäuser (diamonds). The aces of these suits shows scenes from those operas. The publication in 1968 was a limited edition of 500 numbered double decks of 36 cards each. That number is quite common in Switzerland, where Jass is a popular game, requiring only 36 cards. Our double deck has nr. 177 and was acquired in 2003. Although Müller AG did a good printing job in offset, I would loved to have seen these designs in chromolithography in a 1920's deck.