Rene Magritte & Surrealism

Surrealism is a 20th-century avant-garde movement in art and literature that sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind, for example by the irrational juxtaposition of images. The man wearing a bowler hat in Renes pieces was a motif repeated in many photos, the reason why Magritte used this man was unclear. Some believed it was a portrait of himself. It was important that Rene varied the images of the man in the bowler hat because each painting then told a different story left for the viewer to interpret. Surreal artist create strange worlds with their art expressing imaginative dreams and visions free from conscious rational control. Juxtaposition, altered scale, and language helped Magritte explore Surrealism because the juxtaposition made the art random, the language is left for the viewer to interpret, and altered scale was used to disorient viewers. The reason Rene may have covered the faces of  his works was mostly because of when he was a child his mother committed suicide and when she was recovered her face was covered. Magritte strived for realism and precision in his paintings because it allowed for viewers to focus on the subject of work instead of the techniques used to paint it.

Examples: 

in both of these pieces juxtaposition is mainly used, these objects are random and are in areas you usually wouldn't find them. Altered scale is also used because the objects are enlarged and unproportional