The Art of Magritte

René François Ghislain Magritte (21 November 1898 - 15 August 1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images.

Life:
Magritte was born in Lessines, in the province of Hainaut, in 1898, the eldest son of Léopold Magritte, a tailor, and Adeline, a milliner. He began lessons in drawing in 1910. In 1912, his mother committed suicide by drowning herself in the River Sambre. Magritte was present when her body was retrieved from the water. The image of his mother floating, her dress obscuring her face, may have influenced a 1927-1928 series of paintings of people with cloth obscuring their faces, including Les Amants, but Magritte disliked this explanation. He studied at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels for two years until 1918. In 1922 he married Georgette Berger, whom he had met in 1913.

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"My painting is visible images which conceal nothing; they evoke mystery and, indeed, when one sees one of my pictures, one asks oneself this simple question 'What does that mean'? It does not mean anything, because mystery means nothing either, it is unknowable."

"If the dream is a translation of waking life, waking life is also a translation of the dream"

"We must not fear daylight just because it almost always illuminates a miserable world."

"The mind loves the unknown. It loves images whose meaning is unknown, since the meaning of the mind itself is unknown."

"Art evokes the mystery without which the world would not exist."

"I have few illusions: the cause is lost in advance. As for me, I do my part, which is to drag a fairly drab existence to its conclusion."

- René Magritte