The Treachery of Images
Link to image ( Please note copyrights )
La trahison des images (literally: " The Treachery of Images " ) is one of the most famous paintings of René Magritte. It was created in 1929, a 59 x 65 cm oil painting and is now in the County Museum of Los Angeles. Pictured is a pipe, including the words " Ceci n'est pas une pipe. " ( Listen? / I, French for " This is not a pipe. " ) To read.
The most common interpretation according to it was to demonstrate the intention of Magritte that even the most realistic image of an object is not identical with the object itself. Instead, it has at the sitter to do it with an image that could not with an actual whistle that stuff or smoke. So it is with the image as well as about the word " dog ", which also can not bark, as the semiotician William James put it.
Theme and work context
Magritte treated with " La trahison the images" the relationship between the object, its name, and its representation and had this moreover discussed in a series of images in the years 1928 until 1966.
In 1926 the painter sketched this intellectual debate in the form of a drawing, on the one hand a pipe represented abstractly, the other a realistic image of a whistle and also showed abbildete the word " whistle ".
1927 Magritte made the image " Clé des songes " in which four objects are seen next imaged with one word; in three of the articles comply picture and name each other not, this is only the fourth object, a sponge that case.
In 1928, the picture " Miroir vivant " was completed. Against a black background bright, interconnected surfaces are to be seen on which written in black the words " personnage éclatant de rire ", " horizon", " armoire " and " cris d' oiseaux " to read.
Peak and most famous work is the series then in 1929 " La trahison of images", an image that is created Magritte in several versions. The topic of " Clé des songes " he attacked again by 1930 an image with six objects produced, all of which are provided with a false name.
The series of images was finally completed in 1966 with the painting " Les deux mystères ". Then an easel is shown, on which the image " La trahison of images" can be seen during this next image displayed another pipe appears. This is similar to the image in " La trahison of images" Although in form but not in color. The pipe on the image in the picture is more realistic elaborated, while the half- pipe is next to the easel in the dark and rather pale and artificial works.
At " La trahison of images", there are numerous attempts at interpretation, the most famous in 1973 by Michel Foucault entitled " ceci n'est pas une pipe", in which he also documented two letters Magritte. Besides the obvious interpretation that an image is not identical to the original subject, Foucault points out that Magritte by demonstrating an apparent paradox the observer to reflect forces about what one has actually ever meant by the reality of an object.