The survivor 1950

René Magritte painted ‘The Survivor’ using oil on canvas. It’s all so cool and crisp, isn't it? The cool detachment. It looks like a gun propped up in someone’s parlor, though maybe someone should get a mop! Magritte’s painting is like smooth jazz, except it's a little off somehow. What I mean is, the paint application is subtle, so smooth, it's almost trying to disappear. But look at the stock of the rifle. See how the wood grain is painted with these weird blotches of red? That’s where the painting gets interesting. It’s not just a realistic rendering; it's got this weird, unsettling vibe. That little pool of blood there, is a weirdly shaped blotch of paint. It kind of disrupts the whole picture, if you ask me. This painting reminds me a little bit of Giorgio de Chirico, with all its weird angles and sense of foreboding. But Magritte's got his own thing going on, a sort of deadpan humor that makes you think, and maybe squirm a little.