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Rene Magritte Accomplishments

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René Magritte once said “Everything we see hides another thing, we always want to see what is hidden by what we see.” Nearly his whole life’s work was devoted to uncovering what was seen by the eye. His work gave a new perspective to many daily things, and helped to popularize a new style of art, surrealism.
René Magritte was born on November 21, 1898 in Lessines, Belgium. He was the the oldest of three boys in a well-off family. Two major events influenced his career as an artist. The first was when he and a friend saw a painting in a cemetery. The painting encouraged Magritte to paint outside of the box, as the painting had been found in an out of the box location. The second influential event in his life was the suicide of his mother when he was just 14 years old. This was very traumatic for him, as he and his mother were said to be very close. …show more content…

This art school focused on traditional techniques of artistry, which were not interesting to Magritte. This caused him to lose interest in art for a while until a fellow student introduced him to the new and upcoming styles of Futurism, Cubism, and Purism. Art critics say his early works were influenced by Cubists Jean Metzinger and Fernand Leger. Magritte would only identify as a surrealist when he saw the work of Giorgio de Chirico. As Magritte developed his own style and came into his own as an artist, he became more well known. In fact, many of his more well known pieces, including The Son of Man, The Listening Room, and The Blank Check were painted during the latter portion of his

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