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Lot Essay
Torczyner purchased this work, along with Moments musicaux (see lot 308, sale Christie's, New York, 19 November 1998), from Magritte in May 1961. According to Sylvester, the image first appears at the beginning of that year, initially as a gouache (Sylvester, appendix no. 180; private collection).
Although Magritte had not actively used collage since the late 1920s, Le Savoir was among a group of gouaches and papier colls which he told Torczyner he had intended to show in Ostend that year, presumably at the Kunstbezit in ieder bereik exhibition at the Museum voor Schone Kunsten.
In the present work, a bilboquet is the sole occupant of what initially appears to be a room with a door opening onto evening duskiness. But the 'wall' is actually a bright, cloud-filled sky and thus the scene could be a landscape rather than an interior--except for the absurdity of the door which would have materialized in the atmosphere to reveal some other 'space.' The contrasts of light/dark, inside/outside and hidden/revealed in Le Savoir are fundamental polarities in Magritte's imagery.
Although Magritte had not actively used collage since the late 1920s, Le Savoir was among a group of gouaches and papier colls which he told Torczyner he had intended to show in Ostend that year, presumably at the Kunstbezit in ieder bereik exhibition at the Museum voor Schone Kunsten.
In the present work, a bilboquet is the sole occupant of what initially appears to be a room with a door opening onto evening duskiness. But the 'wall' is actually a bright, cloud-filled sky and thus the scene could be a landscape rather than an interior--except for the absurdity of the door which would have materialized in the atmosphere to reveal some other 'space.' The contrasts of light/dark, inside/outside and hidden/revealed in Le Savoir are fundamental polarities in Magritte's imagery.