A richly exotic masterwork of wood printing in Showa era

This is the reproduced edition of a work “torampu-e,” Pictures for Playing Cards which were made in 1939 by Sumio Kawakami, as a playing card. He completes this universal card game as unique one.
His playing cards are woven into creative idea.
Each suit has themes: clubs are Japanese, diamonds are the Near Eastern, spades are Chinese,
and hearts are early European. Every card has different pictures,
so you can enjoy not only as playing cards but also for decorative purposes.
Moreover, each number is assigned motifs too, for example there are buildings on the card numbered 2,
flowers on numbered 5, or the like.
Two joker cards are painted Fukusuke (a big-head dwarf which is believed to bring luck,)
so you may unconsciously smile when you draw joker while playing Old Maid.
There is a picture of “Heppoko-sensei,”the self-portrait of Sumio Kawakami on the case.
“Heppoko-sensei” means unskillful teacher, but it was his favourite nickname as he introduces himself.

Similar to the ordinary playing cards.	Pictures for Playing Cards by Sumio Kawakami Price: 1,800JPY (without tax) JAN code: 4957769009699 Contents: 54 cards (2 jokers are included) Material: case= paper, cards= paper The dimension of the packing case is as follows:H25mm × W80mm × L124mm Weight: 123g (NET) The dimension of the card is as follows:W 63mm × L 89mm