ARTICLE
A. Atanassov created in 2005 a Tarot deck inspired by Gustav Klimt's paintings.
The deck was called The Golden Tarot because many of the paintings have been made by using gold leaves fixed by heat, a millenary technique Klimt frequently used in his works. And Atanassov, the famous deck illustrator, created one based on several of them, producing a very special card suit which seems to be out-of-time, as paintings seem so.
Klimt was born in Austria in the second middle of the XIX century (1862-1918, Cancer) although his works seem not to belong to that age. They're plenty of allegories and symbolisms, far from idealization, with nudities of big sensuality and decadence. There is no trace of the Victorian age in his compositions, a kind of split that even made him move away from the Academy and the Association of Austrian Artists while joining others in the Wiener Sezession (Viena's Secession), an alternative and independent group he founded in 18971. The separation had been preceded by another one five years before, among Münich's artists, and one year later was followed by another one, among Berlin's artists.
Luckily, Klimt didn't leave theoretical discourses about his artworks, so he left us free to enjoy them out of categories and adscriptions. In fact, his paintings seem more modern than those called post-modern ones! Secession didn't establish statements either and, instead, the members were closer to the Gesamtkunstwerk or "total artwork", gathering in a single synthesis typographies, graphic elements, illustrations and even white empty spaces. Contrasts. Naked figures, and other ones wearing widely painted and stamped clothes. Plain figures, with no perspective and in an iconic display, and natural faces of pale flesh. Different atmospheres created by different usages of gold: black borders make it more shining, in a kind of 3D effect, although they can also create an oppressive air if the illustration seems to remain narrowed inside of that frame.Experimenting with linear geometric models and plain figures, the designs also displayed a mostly module composition of fascinating contrasts.
Anyway, Secession did count on an official branch, Ver Sacrum magazine (Sacred Springtime), edited between 1898 and 1903. The title was related to a romantic poem by Ludwig Uhland, and also to an ancient rite of the season when, after a time period, young people were ordered to leave their city or tribe to found a new one. The rite was of a martial kind, since a new foundation usually involved battles to fight for. The cover of the first edition showed the roots of a flourishing tree, with branches holding the coats of arms of architecture, painting and sculpture, breaking the wooden container that had become too small for them. In those first pages, it could be read:
Youth's spirit, blowing in springtime... by which the present always becomes 'modernity', which is the fuel of artistic creation.
VS, 1898, Nº 1, p 5
The members of Secession took Pallas Athena, the goddess of art and war, as the group's leading spirit, and Klimt portrayed her along with her weapons in a painting of the same name in 1898, in which she wears a helmet and a cuirass in her chest. 
In her right hand, she holds a sphere on which can be seen Nuda Veritas, the goddess of Truth and mother of Virtues. Behind her, a battle scene between Hercules and the sea monster Triton (symbol of rigidity and conservatism). Both are on a background of winding shapes seeming to include many tombstones. Atanassov depicted the goddess in card III The Empress, inside of a narrow space among golden and adorned columns, on a reddish background seeming to be active, alive, sizzling, sensed as a bit faraway fires. Athena seems to be at the entrance of those fires, which are placed on the background battle of the painting.
Between 1899 and 1907, Klimt made three paintings for the ceiling of the Great Hall of Viena's University, although they were burnt in 1945 before nazi troops reach them. They were Jurisprudence, Medicine and Philosophy. Two figures in Jurisprudence inspired cards: the man embraced by a pulp's arms, and the figure in the middle of a group drawn in the upper border. 
The man, seeming resigned, giving up and concentrated on his world within, has one of the pulp's eyes as his own head extension, and is one of the main four figures not surrounded by hairs but himself (the pulp). The figure inspired card IX The Hermit, in which there's no extension and the pulp is gone, radically changing the original meaning of the painting: the hermit is headed down, and Atanassov didn't include any other element to be identified with the classic lantern usually guiding him. The rest of the figures around the sea animal are wrapped by long hairs reaching borders and beyond, with spiralled snakes seeming ropes extended all along their bodies: they're a sad woman, an angry woman, and a sleeping woman, all wrapped and tied. 
They might be the same women depicted as Gorgons in Hostile powers, the second wall of a later artwork, Beethoven frieze (1902). But on this painting, the middle figure in the group of three on the background upper border, holding a large sword, inspired card VIII Justice.
Medicine is present in several cards. The central figure looking straight, self-confident and skilled, is the Greek goddess Hygieia related to cleaning and curation. Behind her, a column of hunched naked people, sleeping, painful, with a skeleton showing half of its skull, and even a pregnant woman in the upper right corner (the only figure also looking straight, although with a pleasant expression on her face). Another figure on the left side is specially separated from the rest, reaching out her arm as if not caring, in the same way a man reaches his arm towards her. 
Hygieia is referred to in card I The Magician although she's slightly looking at her right side and seems not too happy but strict about her methods and techniques. And the column of figures is not included in the card but in card XX Judgement, although Atanassov discarded several elements, specifically painful faces and many lines that, in the painting, emphasise the sense of flesh and veins as well as the relevance of the skeleton in the whole composition. So, the card is entirely related to figures remaining asleep with death (even the pregnant woman): no pain, no pleasure.
Whereas the figure remaining apart in the painting is referred to as the woman in card VII The Chariot although, once again, the deck changed it a little bit. Atanassov placed her inside of a chariot, not careless anymore, and even holding up a stick: her hand doesn't fall, she's now on a path, and her gesture is more careful, as becoming more self-oriented.
Philosophy transmits an atmosphere of progressive youth, detachment and freedom. In the lower left area, a male, an old and tormented figure. In the upper area, younger and amazed figures. On the right background, the traits of a calm face while being disintegrated. In the lower area, a female face partially wrapped although clearly illuminated in a fantastic contrast with the rest of the lights, of strong white eyes, like those of Pallas Athena, like a creature from another world. 
However, Atanassov chose the decrepit and lamenting figure to represent card 0 The Fool, thus moving the card away from the spontaneous, "irrational" and unstructuring motion providing energy, lightness and out-of-series audacity.
In 1902, Klimt made Beethoven frieze, an allegoric mural to make homage to the composer on his 75 anniversary, as well as to be part of Max Klinger's display of the musician's sculpture. Of 111.5 ft, the mural is divided into three works on a white background: Longing for happiness (left), Hostile powers (center), and Hymn to joy (right).
In Longing..., enlarged figures are suspended in the air all along the horizontal upper border, as if they were searching for, trying to reach out, although with eyes closed.
Below, three naked figures and other three ones dressed up. The naked ones pay attention to the ones wearing clothes and put their hands together, as imploring. The dressed group is formed by an armoured knight, of a serious gesture and holding a sword, with two figures in the background: Ambition showing a bay leaves crown, and Compassion with a similar gesture to those of the sleeping figures the painter used to draw.
The knight is walking towards Hostile powers, the second part of the mural introducing Typhoeus in the opening, the mythical winged giant made of dragons and snakes, spitting fire and creating hurricanes and earthquakes. The ancient monster is represented by a huge hairy monkey, winged and accompanied by nine figures in three groups: three Gorgons and, showing up from behind Illness, Madness and Death, whereas on his left side Lust, Intemperance and Voluptuousness are gathered. Even more to his left side is Sorrow, naked and like being wrapped in a fine black tulle, in a kind of grid formed by serpents' tail skins.
The second part of the mural inspired card XV The Devil, in which the monkey is not so large (it has no wings). Sorrow, whose presence extends almost half of the painting, has been replaced by Madness, with her arms in the classic dominant gesture representing The Devil card. All figures are sad, sober, and even their tits are too down! Pleasance has gone too, and Gorgons are not expressing their characteristic malice but sorrow, inner pain, as in a mixed identity with the missing Sorrow...
In the last area of the mural, Hymn to joy, Poetry is represented as a figure wearing a golden tunic and playing the zither. Along with her, the previous suspended and longing figures end their pathway of searching. Next, Klimt seems to have left a white space empty, followed by Arts in the form of five female figures, one over another one, two of them as if waiting, and the other three with an extended arm, like the separated figure in Medicine did, with her falling hand. Towards the right, 9 figures, also female ones, float in the air like a choir. Near the end of the wall, two naked figures embrace each other, with feet and ankles wrapped by a skein-like thread.
The couple might be on a yellow background, emitting flows from their heads, but the composition also suggests motion, in the opening of a kind of an arch on the background. The concept of opening is firstly displayed in the small floating elements seeming to fly in the air, composed of three borders that might expand or shrink the nuclear area, like modern gates.
The idea is also suggested by two spheres in the upper area, like suns pushing the arch pieces to the outside with blue stripes. Atanassov was inspired by this section on the wall to design card XIX The Sun, although some additions and subtractions restrained the concept of opening, which was just continued by the floating elements. The couple is not tied by threads anymore, and both are on a background of yellow and dark lines which emphasises the flow emerging from the very union, so the arch opening is not referred to at all. Another change, also contrary to that motion, is the upper spheres depicted now inside of a circular figure, whose emanations are no longer blue as well as they don't go beyond the limits of the perimeter.
Next year to Beethoven frieze, in 1903, Klimt composed Hope I, a painting showing two groups of three figures each. The first group is at the front: one-side of a pregnant woman, naked, wearing a forget-me-not flower crown, which also reaches the head of a dark shape embracing the woman. The shape has claws, eyes and seems to be smiling (which is suggested by a slightly clearer lip-shaped color, a detail creating an effect of our times, almost an emoji!).
Behind the woman, the figure completing the group shows up, one-side of the classic Death, in contrast with nudity by wearing a large blue tunic, a character that is wrapped by the dark shape, too. The second group is in the upper area in the background: the painful Illness, the wrinkled Old Age, and the pale Madness. The painting inspired card XXI The World, although Klimt's groups and identities are missing. The first group, in which the woman might easily be identified with the dark shape (they share the adornment and their sights' look) and with Death (by contrast), now is alone. The second group is simply gone. Maybe the pregnant belly was related to the idea of populating the world, as a literal understanding of the card, but the absence of groups and multiple characters is far from the meaning of options, perspectives and chances classically associated to the cyclic motion pointed out by the card. Anyway, Klimt's painting identities seem too specific to be attached to the card although are an accurate representation of the world's living conditions.
In Portrait of Fritza Riedler (1906), fusions and perspectives are added to contrasting backgrounds (sober rectangles, stained-glasses) and colors (cold in dress and seat, warm on the background).
The figure is seated on an abstract armchair, composed by several geometric surfaces merging with the dress. Among the elements in perspective, there are two background walls, being that of stained-glasses the farthest one. The same wall includes elements distributed in a symmetric pattern, which are repeated on the blue carpet on the floor, keeping perspective. Finally, the fall of the dress and the figure's position are set according to diagonal lines. The woman is clearly represented in card II The Priestess, expressing the same calm as in the paintingalthough with more restrained, formal, closed and serious traits if compared with Klimt's relaxed figure, of opened lips and necklace strips.
Danae (1907) depicts the Greek figure of the same name, who was the daughter of king Acrysius of Argos (Peloponnesus, Greece). The king had been warned by a prophecy that he would be killed by his grandson, so he locked Danae up in an underground chamber or bronze tower. Inside of her prison, she was visited by Zeus, who had taken the form of a golden shower to fertilize her. In the painting, a golden river falls between her legs, by which she got pregnant and gave life to Perseus. Danae is on a clear color background, like an uterus becoming progressively narrower at the lower area, ending like an exit from the womb. The painting inspired card XVIII Moon, in which the river follows the path of the classic waxing Moon pattern of the card, although dismissing the physical born meaning suggested by the clear shape in the painting.
During the same year, Ferdinand Bloch-Bauer, a wealthy businessman who had prospered in the sugar industry and supported Klimt's artworks, asked for a portrait of his wife. 
Contrasts and fusions in Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I are quite similar to those in Fritza's painting made in the preceding year. The figure inspired card X The Wheel of Fortune, in which she lacks of the soft traits of the painting and, instead, is depicted a bit conceited, physically elongated, forgetting some of her original warmness and spirit, and showing a strange change: her neckless lacks of the jewels Adele wears in the painting and, instead, four simple circles in her throat make not too much sense with the rest of the drawing. The wheel where she places her hands is formed by eight sectors, two of them merging with the background, so it emerges a figure alike to the famous pacman, the video game in which the yellow drawing won by eating dots and ghosts. Fortune card, which basically has a karmic meaning in Tarot, might have been associated to that ludic reference and also to the literal wealthness of the sugar trader, in the way that Atanassov had previously connected pregnancy in Hope I to The World card.
Between 1907 and 1908, Klimt composed The kiss, the famous painting remembering the moment in which Apollo kisses the nymph Dafne before she turns into a bay tree. Both of them had been reached by Eros's arrows, the god of love, although Apollo's arrow was made of gold, whereas Dafne's was made of lead, which made her reject him. Both figures are on the edge of a flourished field, wearing contrasting clothes: the man in a tunic of irregular rectangles, the woman in a tight dress of oval stamps. The composition is reflected in card VI The Lovers. And, like in the painting, both dresses are fused with the golden wrapping background.
Finished in 1907, Water Serpents I was one of the few paintings in watercolor and tempera (Klimt mostly used oils). Of very small dimensions (19.6" x 7.8"), it displays two embraced figures (not necessarily women both) usually appreciated inside of a lesbian scene, although half-nudes in overlapped and entangled bodies are a constant in Klimt's works, so the painting may have not been necessarily inspired by a sexual basic meaning. 
Gold leaves clearly add a 3D effect to a composition including a big-head fish on the figures' feet: extremes remain connected to each other, which is a classic meaning of the serpent when considered as an esoteric symbol. The painting inspired card XVII The Star although the sea environment is replaced by a sky background, with stars mostly spread in the upper area. The replacement places the two figures stand up, and the sky is behind. So serpents easily acquire the classic sexual connotation characterizing the ordinary appreciation. Inserting, changing or removing elements by choosing a sexual understanding produces radical changes in symbolic and aesthetic appreciations. Why did Atanassov choose the painting to illustrate the card? It's a mystery since The Star emerges after a deep mature experience, of transcendental processing usually represented by a single figure, as an individual consciousness, who goes beyond Earth from her ancient water origin, undifferentiated, astral in only an emotional sense (literal!). Maybe Klimt represented transcendence in the union of two serpents, Life synthesis! But that could be an option in Klimt's painting, not in Atanassov's illustration.
Klimt made two versions of the story of Judith as told by the Ancient Testament, in 1901 and 1909. Judith was a Jew from Simeon's tribe, widow of Manases and living in Betulia, a city surrounded by the army of the Asyrian general Holofernes, who had been sent by order of the Babilonian king Nabucodonosor. Judith found the way to enter the general's campaign tent, and then cut his head. After the murder, the Asyrian army run away and was defeated.
The painting of 1901 reflects her as a very sensual and carnal 3D figure, contrasting with bidimensional clothes and the plain background, whereas Holofernes' head is partially displayed in the lower right corner. But Atanassov chose the 1909 version, of adorned decadence and death, to illustrate card XI Strength. In Judith II, the figure remains narrowed among frames, with crisped hands as claws although wearing bracelets in her wrists. Murder as such becomes relevant, since Holofernes is a much more present figure if compared with the previous version. Besides, the card includes adorned frames, and Judith shows that fixed and rigid expression suggested by Atanassov's persistent closed lips.
In Death and Life (1910), Klimt represented the Grim Reaper as an elongated skeleton covered by a blue and purple tunic, full of crosses. The character holds a little gnarled club, and looks at Life with its eternal smile. Life is on the right, characterized by several figures, some of them naked and some others half dressed up, intertwined and of different ages. The painting was the reference for illustrating card XIII Death.
Near his death hour, Klimt painted Adam and Eve (1917-18), in a quite sensual and sexual scene. 
The painting inspired card XIV Temperance, although the last one includes an apple, the forbidden symbol, and the figure accordingly lacks of the voluptuous shapes and pleasant expressions characterizing the painting.
This way to represent the card's motif is quite singular, since the liquid being poured doesn't flow from vessel to vessel and, instead, just fills up a head lying on the floor. A first impression of Atanassov's illustration is the head seemingly hanging from Eve's hand, which has nothing to do with the card's meaning. But other changes made by Atanassov are relevant for Tarot, since without exchanges the card misses the fruitful meaning of growth and creative potential only emerging by experiencing real and reciprocal interactions (with the environment, context or other people). Since influence happens in a single flow direction, and touching the woman is forbidden, then balance and harmonization (which always depend on relationships) don't come out as authentic experiences.
Other cards such as The Hanged Man (XII) and The Tower (XVI) might not be inspired by specific paintings although follow the same style pattern of naked decadence and accentuated traits, on merged backgrounds and mostly 2D decoration. Whereas The Emperor (IV) resembles Pallas Athena as a male version, and The High Priest (V) depicts Klimt's figure.
About golden leaves
Gold has been used over thousands of years, in different regions and ways, in sculptures as well as in paintings and architectural works. After the final melting of the metal, a craft hammering process or a constant roller pressure produce fine leaves, which must be handled delicately by special tools for avoiding breaks. A single .19" gold nugget can be transformed into a 1.64 ft leaf.
Techniques to melt metal, produce leaves and also work on the surface to be goldened, vary according to the laboral tradition and the quality of the metal. For a home and simple usage of low quality leaves, the chosen surface to golden must first be varnished, waiting until is dried although sticky, so when the leaf is placed upon it, it remains attached. Then, the rests are removed and, finally, the leaf is fixated by painting with a lac substance.
Sources: El Separatismo Vienés, Gustav Klimt en Wikipedia, National Library of Austria., Cómo aplicar pan de oro en 4 pasos.
Note: images displayed in the article might not be exact or complete reproductions of the original paintings.
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