René Magritte

Alexander Iolas, Paris
Private Collection, Switzerland (acquired from the above circa 1965)
Sale: Sotheby's, New York, 3rd May 2005, lot 35
Purchased at the above sale by the present owner

Paris, Galerie Alexander Iolas, Magritte: le sens propre, 1964, no. 37
New York, Iolas Gallery, Magritte: le sens propre, 1965
Los Angeles, County Museum of Art, Magritte and Contemporary Art: The Treachery of Images, 2006-07, illustrated in colour in the catalogue 

Letter from Magritte to André Bosmans, 24th October 1964, in Francine Perceval (ed.), Lettres à André Bosmans 1958-1967, Brussels, 1990, p. 392
(possibly) Henri Michaux, 'En rêvant à partir de peintures énigmatiques', in Mercure de France, Paris, December 1964, p. 596
Partick Waldberg, René Magritte, 1965, illustrated p. 47
David Sylvester (ed.), Sarah Whitfield & Michael Raeburn, René Magritte. Catalogue Raisonné, Gouaches, Temperas, Watercolours and Papier Collés 1918-1967, London, 1994, no. 1571, illustrated p. 277

Executed on cream wove paper, not laid down, taped to the mount at intervals on the reverse. There are remnants of tape from previous mounting on the reverse of all four corners. Apart from a very small damage in the top left corner (not visible when mounted), and a small water stain towards the middle of the top edge (partly visible when mounted), this work is in very good condition. Colours: Overall fairly accurate, although slightly fresher and stronger in the original, particularly in the blue pigments.
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Executed in 1964, Par une belle fin d'après-midi is a captivating example of one of the central themes of Magritte's art, that of unexpectedly juxtaposed objects seen in a generic, unidentified landscape. In this work, the artist has turned an everyday scene, that of two people sitting on a brick wall and talking, into one that is at the same time comical and macabre, by replacing the figures with coffins. With an extraordinary simplicity of means and sharpness of execution that characterised his later work, Magritte created an image of mystery and ambiguity: it is unclear whether the figures have been metamorphosed into coffins or are hidden inside them. In either case, we are confronted with an image in which life has been turned into death.

 

In several other works on this theme, Magritte applied this subject to famous images in art history, most notably in Perspective: Madame Récamier de David and Perspective: Le Balcon de Manet, both painted in 1950. Around the same time he executed the present work, Magritte also produced one oil and one gouache version of this subject, both titled La Belle hérétique, each showing a single coffin seated on a similar stone wall. In the present work, however, the two coffins are slightly turned towards each other, suggesting the act of conversation, which gives them a more animated character, thus further confusing the notions of life and death.

 

In a letter to André Bosmans of 24^th October 1964, Magritte wrote about two gouaches he did for the forthcoming exhibition at Iolas' gallery in Paris. One of them was the present work: 'Have also redone two coffins seated in a mountainous landscape, with a new title: "One fine late afternoon"' (quoted in D. Sylvester (ed.), op. cit., p. 277). Magritte's friend and fellow Surrealist Marcel Mariën recalled how he and Nougé burst out laughing when they first saw one of the gouaches on this subject: 'because the fact is ... the image is comic – laughter and death, it is well known, have always gone hand in hand' (quoted in Sarah Whitfield, Magritte (exhibition catalogue), Hayward Gallery, London, 1992, p. 294).