René Magritte

The Acrobat's Exercises.

The mystery of what is visible is to be found in the body, in the powers of the body, a discovery conveyed by The Acrobat's Exercises. The suppleness of the acrobat, holding a death-dealing rifle in his right hand, a musical instrument in his left; the head, depicted three times; the sexual organs, totally excluded under these impossible athletic contortions

The Lovers.

In The Lovers, he points to the blind nature of love by doubling what is obvious and placing a veil over the faces of the lovers, who are thus left to their sweet blindness.

The White Race.

The White Race presents a surprising vision of the human body and establishes a new hierarchy of values. There is only one eye, one ear; eyes and ears are unique, like the mouth, the organ of speech. The solitary, cyclops-like eye, its dominant central position at the very top evoking a sense of transcendence, is located above the ear, which in turn is borne by the mouth.

The Rape.

The Rape demonstrates all too obviously that painting is also capable of taking hold of the anatomy of the human body, capturing it in pictures and transforming it. The eyes become breasts, the nose - the middle of the face - is now the navel, the mouth the genitals.

Dangerous Liaisons. 1926. Oil on canvas. 72 x 64 cm. Private collection.

Dangerous Liaisons, which has been strikingly interpreted by Max Loreau, depicts a naked woman. The mirror which she is holding in her hands is turned towards the observer. It covers her body from shoulders to thighs; simultaneously, however, it reflects precisely that part of her body which it is covering, seen reduced and from a different perspective.

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René Magritte was born on the 21st November, 1898 in Hainaut, Belgium. His father was a tailor and a merchant. As his business did not go well the family had to move often. René lost his mother early and tragically – she committed suicide for unclear reasons. René was only 14 years old at the time.

From 1916 through 1918 Magritte studied in the Royal Academy of Arts in Brussels (Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts). He became a wallpaper designer and commercial artist. His early painting works were executed under the influence of the Cubism and Futurism (1918-20), then he was inspired by the Purists and Fernand Léger.

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