Two Diamonds, from the Playing Cards series (N84) to promote Turkish Cross-Cut Cigarettes for W. Duke, Sons and Co. 1888

Editor: So this is “Two Diamonds” from the Playing Cards series, a promotional print made by W. Duke, Sons and Co. around 1888. The simple geometric shapes against the aged paper give it a strange, stark quality. How should we read an image like this? Curator: The diamond itself, divorced from the deck, from the game... It transforms into a charged symbol. Diamonds represent wealth, risk, the gleam of material desire. But consider the doubling - two diamonds. Is this amplification, or a reduction? Editor: Reduction? Curator: Two can indicate duality, conflict even. Consider the Janus figure in Roman mythology, two faces looking opposite directions. The mirroring hints at deeper psychological states – doubling and splitting. What does this doubling suggest in relation to consumerism? Editor: Perhaps it hints at the duality of consumer desire? The initial excitement, then the hollowness that drives the need for more? The advertisement aims to stoke this very cycle! Curator: Precisely! And even more specifically here, "Turkish Cross-Cut Cigarettes." The "cross" is another layer, the cross-section perhaps alluding to a loss, a sacrifice of sorts... Do you sense a faint aroma of mortality intertwined? Editor: Definitely! Now, I'm not only seeing playing card suit, but also a kind of psychological diagram! I wonder if viewers at the time would have perceived the same depth. Curator: That tension, that dance between surface and symbol is crucial to how we view art as a bridge, then and now.