Ceci n’est pas un blog page

So here it is…my first blog. Yay. I’m very excited. Are you excited? I’m excited.

Well, I thought as I’m passing  myself off as an artist I would write about something vaguely arty. As such, I’d like to present one of my favourite pieces of art from one of my favourite artists.

Rene Magritte's 'The treachery of Images'

You’ve probably seen it before; it’s a very famous painting. The writing underneath is French, meaning ‘This is not a pipe.’

Now, if you’re scratching your head looking at the picture thinking ‘Duh. But it is a pipe.’ I assure you, it’s not; it’s a picture of a pipe. In fact, it’s not even a picture of a pipe. It’s a pixelated representation of a picture of a pipe. If you’re not sure of the difference, go ahead and try and smoke it. Tastes like plastic doesn’t it? That’s because it’s not a pipe (as I said).

So, if I’m making your head hurt (and it’s not from the pipe fumes) that means your brain’s working. Congratulations. And that ladies and gentlemen is what real art does. It makes you think.

Magritte points out that no matter how closely, through realism-art, we come to depicting an item accurately, we never do catch the item itself. As Michelangelo says ‘The true work of art is but a shadow of the Divine perfection’. So what’s the point of recreating something when it will never be as brilliant and magnificent as the real thing? Probably because it’s a lot more convenient to have a picture of a horse in your house than an actual horse.

And just for laughs (because art does not always have to be serious):