Hey Don,
Thanks for the feedback. Regarding the theme choice, its a very valid point, and im happy to hear the forum opinion. Personally I have a very keen interest in modern/conflict history, and people can always be interested in learning about these characters and their historical influence and political decision-making (including learning the reasons as to why they're heinous). These characters still form an important part of recent world history whether we like it or not, and im not naive to the ugliness of each. Matt
I don't know... We're not exactly talking about a beautiful subject here, and beauty in art is what sells it more often than not. And I'm not strictly talking about the acts of the people you're portraying, but the people themselves - pardon my flippancy, but I can't imagine the Ayatollah Khomeini, Muammar Qaddafi or Saddam Hussein winning many "Sexiest Man Alive or Dead" contests. It just seems a little too sensationalistic. I can easily learn about these subject in encyclopedia and history books, but I find it very difficult to imagine wanting to use their images for a round of solitaire, a game of poker with friends or even a magic trick.
Perhaps it's simply my tastes and sensibilities, but I don't find the subject matter appealing or appropriate for a pack of custom playing cards. It feels like the playing card equivalent of tabloid journalism, but worse, because it's using tragedies to sell a product devoid of any real educational value about the tragedies. You are, of course, free to express yourself in this manner by creating this deck and I'd never deny you your right to do so - but at the same time, I'm free to express my displeasure with it and to neither purchase it nor encourage others to do so.
Furthermore, for the very same reasons I find this project objectionable, you might find it challenging to find a quality playing card company willing to take on the job of printing it, so before issuing promises of your deck being made by any specific manufacturer, I'd check first to see if they're willing to take on your job, lest you be accused of bait-and-switch advertising. I've seen other, larger and more established companies run afoul of this before, as when the US Playing Card Company forced Big Blind Media to redesign their Karnival Inferno deck and remove the Bicycle brand name from it before they would agree to print it. Print companies are free to decline projects based on moral or aesthetic objections and do so fairly regularly, I would imagine. This might not mean much to you, but for playing card collectors, they look for decks made by quality printers, so while you might find some company willing to do the work, you might find collectors less than enthusiastic about the deck if it's not made by one of the better-quality print companies, even if they can get around any possible moral or ethical quandaries they have about the subject matter.
You know, something did just occur to me. The estates of some of these historical figures you've chosen may actually raise objections to having their images portrayed in your deck. Have you sought licensing rights for their images? Should you fail to do so, you could be exposing yourself to legal liability. Image likenesses of the deceased as well as the living can be protected under copyright law in the United States, so without model releases or licensing agreements in place, you could be vulnerable to civil lawsuits. Sometimes they might simply seek monetary damages, but in your case, as you're portraying them in a deck of cards describing them as dictators, they might attempt to seek an injunction from having the deck distributed - if you went ahead and printed them, they could, in the event of a successful lawsuit, have a court order the decks to be destroyed AND win monetary damages.
When it comes to portraying people who are either alive or dead within a few generations of the present, you really do have to tread carefully and insure you have permission in place before going forward. You could try to argue that they are historical figures, but even historical figures have a right to control how their own images are used outside of reportage of historical facts in a newspaper, news magazine, etc. Marilyn Monroe is a historical figure who's been dead longer than all three of the people you've listed so far for your project, but if I wanted to make a deck of cards with her image in them, even if the images are artist's renderings and not photographs, I would require the permission of her estate. Many card printing companies, not the least of which, the US Playing Card Company, would require that you have such permission in place in advance before even accepting your project to be printed - their Legal Department is very specific about insuring a deck's creator has the rights to all artwork contain within their project before going forward because of the liability it creates for their company if the rights aren't in place.
(Read 1255 times)
