Cover painting on Dummett's Game of Tarot/Twelve Tarot Games

[Mabuse]

I have seen the cover of Game of Tarot on Ebay recently.
http://search.ebay.com/tarot-dummett_W0QQsojsZ1QQfromZR40
This painting is also the same on Twelve Tarot Games.
http://search.ebay.com/tarot-dummett_W0QQsojsZ1QQfromZR40

I am curious as to the origin of this painting. Does anyone here know who is the artist?

 

[Cerulean]

I can tell you the location in Milan

http://home.pacbell.net/mkgreer/TarotTour.html

Castle Borromeo (sp)...will take a bit of time for me to find the artist...maybe someone here knows it offhand.

Regards

Cerulean

 

[Cerulean]

Here's the page...it is not known for certain...

http://www.discountmilano.com/tour/Rinascimento/Borromeo/index.html

Even when I see an alterpiece at the Stanford Museum in the Gothic style, it says "School of Bonafacio Bembo" rather than one distinct painter; the noble patrons didn't always hold their household illuminators and painters in as high regard, alas!

Cerulean

 

[Mabuse]

Thank you

It's a mural then. A five player Tarocchi game? or perhaps the dealer sits out. It does indeed resemble the Visconti-Sforza decks

 

[Mabuse]

Here's another link where it appears

http://l-pollett.tripod.com/cards31.htm

 

[DoctorArcanus]

Here you find one more (partial) image: http://www.scudit.net/mdcartestoria.htm

This fresco is in Palazzo Borromeo in Milan.
The Milano guidebook by Touring Club Italiano says:
A room of the palace is decorated with frescos representing games of the Milanese Nobles: game of Tarot, game of the Palm [I don't know what this is] and game of the Ball [an ancestor of tennis]. This frescos have an high artistic and iconographic value. They were painted by an artist of international gothic style in the first half of the XV Century. The artist has been identified as Giovanni Zenoni or Pisanello.

The style of Pisanello is very similar to that of this fresco. Compare the second player from the left with the portrait of Leonello d’Este (attached).
Actually, even if the fresco is known as the Tarot Players, it is not sure that it represents a game of Tarot. The images on the cards are faded since a long time, and the cards that are still readable (or were readable a few decades ago) are pips.

Marco