Rene Magritte and Norman Rockwell
Rene Magritte (1898-1967)
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“ It is a union that suggests the essential
mystery of the world. Art for me is not an
end in itself, but a means of evoking that
mystery. ” — René Magritte on putting seemingly unrelated
objects together in juxtaposition
Rene Magritte, Belgium surrealist
Magritte's work
frequently displays a
collection of ordinary
objects in an unusual
context, giving new
meanings to familiar
things.
Rene Magritte, Belgium artist

The use of objects as other than what
they seem is typified in his painting. The
Treachery of Images (La trahison des
images), which shows a pipe that looks as
though it is a model for a tobacco store
advertisement.
Rene Magritte

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Magritte painted below the pipe "Ceci
n'est pas une pipe" ("This is not a pipe"),
which seems a contradiction, but is
actually true: the painting is not a pipe, it
is an image of a pipe.
One of various splashes appearing in the title screen of the video game
Minecraft reads "Ceci n'est pas une title screen!".
Rene Magritte: Witty
Magritte used the same
approach in a painting
of an apple: he painted
the fruit and then used
an internal caption or
framing device to deny
that the item was an
apple.
Rene Magritte: Surrealism
His work challenges observers'
preconditioned perceptions of reality.
Rene Magritte
“One night, I woke up in a room
in which a cage with a bird sleeping
in it had been placed. A magnificent
error caused me to see an egg in the
cage, instead of the vanished bird. I
then grasped a new and astonishing
poetic secret, for the shock which I
experienced had been provoked
precisely by the affinity of two objects –
the cage and the egg -- to each other,
whereas previously this shock had been
caused by my bringing together two objects
that were unrelated.”
Rene Magritte
Magritte is best known for his
realistic depictions of ordinary
things made surreal by context
or their relationship to each
other.
The Portrait
This painting depicts an almost photo-realistic
table setting with a slice of ham in the center. The
scene is made surreal by the presence of an eye
staring back at the viewer from the center of the
ham.
Norman Rockwell (1894 -1978)
His works enjoy a broad
popular appeal in the
United States for their
reflection of American
culture. Rockwell is most
famous for the cover
illustrations of everyday life
scenarios he created for
The Saturday Evening Post.
The Clock Mender
(was on the cover of the Post)
Norman Rockwell, American painter
For "vivid and affectionate portraits of our
country," Rockwell received the
Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United
States of America's highest civilian honor, in
1977.
Norman Rockwell
Norman Rockwell was a prolific artist,
producing over 4,000 original works in his
lifetime.
Boy and Girl Gazing at the Moon
Norman Rockwell
This painting was
on the
cover of Popular
Science magazine in
1920.
Norman Rockwell’s later years
He began receiving more
attention as a painter
when he chose more
serious subjects
such as racism. One
example of
this more serious work is The Problem We All Live
With, which dealt with the issue of school
racial integration. The painting depicts a young
girl, Ruby Bridges, flanked by white federal
marshals, walking to school past a wall
defaced by racist graffiti.