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Lot Essay
The easel in La belle captive supports a frame through which a quiet moonlit sea can be seen. The night and the fire lend a warm atmosphere to this Surreal nocturnal seascape. However, it is only on seeing the reflection of the flames in the corner that one perceives the Surrealist nature of this work. Like most of Magritte's paintings within a painting, the frame holds a picture which perfectly represents the scene surrounding it.
La condition humaine, now housed in the National Gallery of Art Washington, D.C., was another work by Magritte which, like La belle captive, showed a painting depicting exactly the same landscape as should appear behind it, but in this case the painting was set before a window revealing a verdant exterior. Of it, the artist wrote: 'the tree in the picture hid the tree behind it, outside the room. For the spectator, it was both inside the room and outside in the real world. We see it ourselves, and at the same time we only have a representation of it ourselves. In the same way, we sometimes situate in the past something that is happening in the present. Time and space thus lose the vulgar meaning that only daily experience takes into account.' (Magritte, quoted in H. Torczyner, Magritte: Ideas and Images, trans. Richard Miller, New York, 1977, p. 156).
La belle captive reflects Magritte's prolonged fascination with the nature of painting as a record of reality. The accuracy of his highly finished technique bolsters the conundrum of a painting really representing the world. Within the universe of La belle captive, a painting has been made which perfectly achieves that result, perennially capturing the writhing sea behind it. In the same way, Magritte's art was intended to be a timeless portal to the reality of the world depicting, as within La belle captive, not a mere instance, but a lasting truth. This painting is a manifesto, a pictorial explanation, of the nature of art.
The simple composition of La belle captive lends itself well to Magritte's exploration of the paradox of painting the world. The central painting appears as if it were a door within a door, a perfect miniature echo of the painting itself. The fire on the one side, so important as an indicator of the artifice of the work on the easel, is balanced by a boulder on the other side. The rock is a perfect foil to the fire as it is unmoving and static, a solid object, unlike the dancing flames on the right. This contrast between static and moving elements highlights the ambiguity of the moving/unmoving Surreal painting on the beach. La belle captive is a contemplative disruption and investigation into the nature of time, art and indeed the reality so muffled by 'daily experience'.
The present work was part of the celebrated Magritte collection of the artist's brother Raymond. It remained in the Magritte family from its purchase circa 1950 until its sale at Christie's in 2001 by Arlette Magritte.
La condition humaine, now housed in the National Gallery of Art Washington, D.C., was another work by Magritte which, like La belle captive, showed a painting depicting exactly the same landscape as should appear behind it, but in this case the painting was set before a window revealing a verdant exterior. Of it, the artist wrote: 'the tree in the picture hid the tree behind it, outside the room. For the spectator, it was both inside the room and outside in the real world. We see it ourselves, and at the same time we only have a representation of it ourselves. In the same way, we sometimes situate in the past something that is happening in the present. Time and space thus lose the vulgar meaning that only daily experience takes into account.' (Magritte, quoted in H. Torczyner, Magritte: Ideas and Images, trans. Richard Miller, New York, 1977, p. 156).
La belle captive reflects Magritte's prolonged fascination with the nature of painting as a record of reality. The accuracy of his highly finished technique bolsters the conundrum of a painting really representing the world. Within the universe of La belle captive, a painting has been made which perfectly achieves that result, perennially capturing the writhing sea behind it. In the same way, Magritte's art was intended to be a timeless portal to the reality of the world depicting, as within La belle captive, not a mere instance, but a lasting truth. This painting is a manifesto, a pictorial explanation, of the nature of art.
The simple composition of La belle captive lends itself well to Magritte's exploration of the paradox of painting the world. The central painting appears as if it were a door within a door, a perfect miniature echo of the painting itself. The fire on the one side, so important as an indicator of the artifice of the work on the easel, is balanced by a boulder on the other side. The rock is a perfect foil to the fire as it is unmoving and static, a solid object, unlike the dancing flames on the right. This contrast between static and moving elements highlights the ambiguity of the moving/unmoving Surreal painting on the beach. La belle captive is a contemplative disruption and investigation into the nature of time, art and indeed the reality so muffled by 'daily experience'.
The present work was part of the celebrated Magritte collection of the artist's brother Raymond. It remained in the Magritte family from its purchase circa 1950 until its sale at Christie's in 2001 by Arlette Magritte.