Can we get some more pics of sophisticated artwork in this forum?

[rocksteady]

Réné Magritte, La reproduction interdite, 1937, oil on canvas, 81.3 x 65 cm (©Museum Boymans-van Beuningen).



the first time i ever saw this painting i was
it was in my high school humanities class and i think i was about 15 or 16 years old (early 90s) on one of those old school carousel projector slide shows, lol.

i couldn't understand or make sense of the man standing in front of the mirror, yet the reflection in the mirror was not of his face, but what i as the observer was seeing.

before this, i would usually at anything that was abstract or not realistic - my opinion at the time was that the more realistic the art, the "better" the art and artist.

i clearly remember how awestruck i was and now that i think back, a new pathway or "mind space" was formed, in terms of how i perceive objects in the world (reality) and if the image is truly what i think i'm seeing (illusion).

In his Surrealist Manifesto published in 1924, poet and critic André Breton, making extensive use of theories adapted from Sigmund Freud, proposed that the conscious and unconscious artistic impulses be reunited under the artistic banner he termed “surrealism”:

I believe in the future resolution of these two states, dream and reality, which are seemingly so contradictory, into a kind of absolute reality, a surreality, if one may so speak.

Breton advocated banishing reason from the realm of artistic creation, arguing that a reliance on “automatism” (unconscious, spontaneous behavior) would call forth more authentic images from the dream and supernatural states.

For his masterful La reproduction interdite (Not to be reproduced) Réné Magritte has created a representation of his subject—Edward James, a rich English aristocrat, Surrealist poet, and patron of both Dali and Magritte—that is both rigorously realistic and emotionally detached. A master at posing familiar objects in absurd contexts, Magritte made extensive use of mirror and glass in his work, playing with their ability to hide or mask through reflection. In this painting Magritte presents us with the view of his subject seen from behind. The reflection in the mirror beyond, however, violates the laws of nature, for it reflects that very same backside view back to us. We gaze over the man’s shoulder expecting to see his face (i.e. his specific identity) and are met instead with the view from our own eyes. The subject’s identity is hidden from us. In the world Magritte has created here we can only ever return to ourselves (i.e. our own reality).

imagine looking at the person in the mirror being watched by the man in front of the mirror, being watched by you and someone behind you watching you looking at the image (painting).



the reason i think that is kind of cool is because you are now part of the painting or you and the painting are a part of each other in a new painting (image) in space and in your mind - realization of the objective and subjective in a way, at the same time (mystery).

#RE