{"product_id":"desire-despair","title":"Desire Despair","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eDesire Despair stacks a century of image-making into a single tall column. A monochrome film still of a woman's face sits at the top against gold foliate wallpaper; below her, embracing couples painted in warm flesh tones give way to a cool blue field where symmetrical inkblot forms open across the lower third. The words DESIRE and DESPAIR are lettered vertically through the middle in red and blue, each partly hidden by the figures they cross.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThe support is unusual and deliberate. Oil on magnetic vinyl gives the work a commercial feel, closer to signage or display material than to traditional canvas, and that choice puts the painting in the same material world as the advertising imagery it draws from.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eGrande has said nothing is off limits, and the painting proves it. Hollywood melodrama, Rorschach psychology, decorative gilt pattern, and hand-lettered typography are set into one another until the narrative collapses. The two words name emotions that mainstream romance keeps carefully separate, and the composition puts them on intersecting axes.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eReading the painting requires moving the eye up and down rather than scanning across, which turns the viewing itself into a descent from the glamour at the top to the dissolution at the bottom.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"John Grande","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54258466881900,"sku":null,"price":13000.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0957\/9023\/6012\/files\/0H9A9949.jpg?v=1790281557","url":"https:\/\/www.mashgallery.com\/products\/desire-despair","provider":"MASH Gallery","version":"1.0","type":"link"}