The sunlight was a forgery, or a precise Tarot reading.
—J. Karl Bogartte, Antibodies: A Surrealist Novella

Photo: The Capricious Sun King, by Gilderic

In honor of Bonnie Cehovet's article about working with Tarot shadows, here's an illustration from 1912 featuring a procession of Tarot shadows, including the Fool's dog!

A scene from the story, "Inchcape Rock" (Charles H. Sylvester, Journeys Through Bookland, 1909)

A Screenplay Directed by the Tarot

Juan Lopez Moctezuma’s phantasmagorical film The Mansion of Madness (1972) is loosely based upon Edgar Allan Poe’s “The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether,” in which inmates take over a mental institution and change places with the doctors.

Within minutes of the film, it becomes obvious that Moctezuma used Tarot cards to develop his story, character by character and scene by scene. Every archetype of the Major Arcana appears in the film, as do several court cards. A Hermit character is dressed in a brown robe and holds a lantern. A self-proclaimed Emperor sits on a throne, in full regalia. An effigy of a Hanged Man is used to stop a horse-drawn Chariot. A High Priestess with a bejeweled third eye performs a ritual dance. A self-described Magician creates the illusion that a man has three shadows (two of which end up belonging to the goons who carry the man to his cell; this scene symbolically communicates the profound wisdom that one’s convictions make one a convict). A scythe-wielding Death figure threatens the Fool who stumbled into this truly insane asylum.

Moctezuma’s love of the Tarot was presumably fostered by his collaborations with fellow director and Tarot enthusiast Alejandro Jodorowsky (who worked with Phillipe Camoin to restore the Marseille deck). The film adaptation of Poe’s story is all the richer for being imbued with Tarot imagery.

See film stills of the full Major Arcana here, as well as a free online reading.

Special thanks to Tarot Elements for showcasing our Mansion of Madness Tarot.

A semicolon as an inverted Hanged Man.

A Strength card, in which Dorothy meets the Cowardly Lion, from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, first edition.

A beautiful image of Lohengrin, the Swan Knight, from an early 20th century postcard. I can't help but think of the Knight of Cups.

This cigarette card was part of a series on British coins and costumes. It depicts an Angel of Edward IV coin. I think it makes a great Knight of Coins.

A lovely urn by 18th century decorative artist Michel Angelo Pergolesi. Makes a lavish Ace of Cups.

In contrast to the severe and elegant portrait of the Empress Dowager Cixi, there is this lush Madonna and Child by Carlo Crivelli. The beautiful bower which surrounds her, her serene attitude, and her glorious garment all convey the ideas of fecundity, nurturing, and majesty that one typically associates with the Empress card.

Her authority is an expression of the earth's own life giving and life sustaining powers, and is tied into the seasons, in particular its times of birth and growth. Thus, the Empress manifests in the affairs of people through the acts as cultivating, harvesting, and preparing food, as well as in pregnancy, childbirth, and raising of children. She represents nature in full bloom, and her power is the natural power of the earth, in contrast to the man-made power of her masculine counterpart, the Emperor.