''The Treachery of Images'' (french: La Trahison des Images, link=no) is a 1929 painting by Belgian

surrealist Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. Its aim was, according to ...

painter

René Magritte René François Ghislain Magritte (; 21 November 1898 – 15 August 1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist known for his depictions of familiar objects in unfamiliar, unexpected contexts, which often provoked questions about the nature and bound ...

. It is also known as ''This Is Not a Pipe'' and ''The Wind and the Song''. Magritte painted it when he was 30 years old. It is on display at the

Los Angeles County Museum of Art The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum). LACMA was founded in 19 ...

. The painting shows an image of a

pipe Pipe(s), PIPE(S) or piping may refer to: Objects * Pipe (fluid conveyance), a hollow cylinder following certain dimension rules ** Piping, the use of pipes in industry * Smoking pipe ** Tobacco pipe * Half-pipe and quarter pipe, semi-circular ...

. Below it, Magritte painted, "", French for "This is not a pipe". The theme of pipes with the text "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" is extended in ''Les Mots et Les Images'', ''La Clé des Songes'', ''Ceci n'est pas une pipe (L'air et la chanson)'', ''The Tune and Also the Words'', ''Ceci n’est pas une pomme'', and ''Les Deux Mystères''. The painting is sometimes given as an example of

meta message Subtext is any content of a creative work, which is not announced explicitly (by characters or author), but is implicit, or becomes something understood by the audience. Subtext has been used historically to imply controversial subjects without ...

conveyed by

paralanguage Paralanguage, also known as vocalics, is a component of meta-communication that may modify meaning, give nuanced meaning, or convey emotion, by using techniques such as prosody, pitch, volume, intonation, etc. It is sometimes defined as relati ...

, like

Alfred Korzybski Alfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski (, ; July 3, 1879 – March 1, 1950) was a Polish-American independent scholar who developed a field called general semantics, which he viewed as both distinct from, and more encompassing than, the field of s ...

's "The word is not the thing" and " The map is not the territory", as well as

Denis Diderot Denis Diderot (; ; 5 October 171331 July 1784) was a French philosopher, art critic, and writer, best known for serving as co-founder, chief editor, and contributor to the '' Encyclopédie'' along with Jean le Rond d'Alembert. He was a promi ...

's ''

This is not a story ''This is not a story'' (or ''This is not just a story''; French: Ceci n’est pas un conte) is a story by the French author Denis Diderot written in 1772. The three ''Moral Stories'' ''This is not a story'', '' Madame de La Carlière'' and the '' ...

''. On December 15, 1929,

Paul Éluard Paul Éluard (), born Eugène Émile Paul Grindel (; 14 December 1895 – 18 November 1952), was a French poet and one of the founders of the Surrealist movement. In 1916, he chose the name Paul Éluard, a matronymic borrowed from his maternal ...

and

André Breton André Robert Breton (; 19 February 1896 – 28 September 1966) was a French writer and poet, the co-founder, leader, and principal theorist of surrealism. His writings include the first '' Surrealist Manifesto'' (''Manifeste du surréalisme'') ...

published an essay about poetry in ''

La Révolution surréaliste ''La Révolution surréaliste'' (English: ''The Surrealist Revolution'') was a publication by the Surrealists in Paris. Twelve issues were published between 1924 and 1929. Shortly after releasing the first ''Surrealist Manifesto'', André Breton ...

'' (The Surrealist Revolution) as a reaction to the publication by poet Paul Valéry "Notes sur la poésie" in ''

Les Nouvelles littéraires ''Les Nouvelles littéraires'' was a French literary and artistic newspaper created in October 1922 by the Éditions Larousse. It disappeared in 1985 after having taken the title '. History ''Les Nouvelles littéraires'' were headed by from 1922 ...

'' of September 28, 1929. When Valéry wrote "Poetry is a survival", Breton and Éluard made fun of it and wrote "Poetry is a pipe", as a reference to Magritte's painting. In the same edition of ''La Révolution surréaliste'', Magritte published "''Les mots et les images''" (his founding text which illustrated where words play with images), his answer to the survey on love, and ''Je ne vois pas la

emme Emme may refer to: People: * Ivan Fyodorovich Emme (1763–1839), Russian lieutenant general in the Napoleonic Wars * Otto J. Emme, American politician and World War I veteran * Emme Gerhard (1872–1946), American photographer * Emme Rylan, Am ...

cachée dans la forêt'', a painting tableau surrounded by photos of sixteen surrealists with their eyes closed, including Magritte himself.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Treachery of Images, The Paintings by René Magritte 1929 paintings Collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art Paradoxes Rhetorical techniques

See also

References

Further reading

External links