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Keishobou Tarot      1973 Gaichi Muramatsu      Japan                                                   Art Medium: Description: The first Japanese tarot production would appear to be the tarot deck and book issued by the publisher Keishobou in 1974. The book cover collages imagery, in the form of woodcuts and engravings, from various European alchemical, magical and emblematic works. The tarot deck itself, a full set of Majors and Minors, was created by Gaichi Muramatsu. It is a hybrid; the Marseilles style deck (providing the inspiration for the Majors and Court cards) and the Rider Waite deck (providing the Minors, with the imagery redrawn in Marseilles woodcut style. It adopts a rather restricted palette of red, green, brown, yellow and black. This was probably to reduce the costs, as the cards were screen printed in only five colours. Gaichi has also chosen to redraw the centre parts of the image so that often parts of the peripheral image are awkwardly cropped. Also called 'Secret Tarot'.