René Magritte

Alexander Iolas Gallery, New York (acquired from the artist in 1958)
Jacques Kaplan (acquired from the above in 1965)
Acquired from the above by the family of the previous owner in 1965

New York, Alexander Iolas Gallery, René Magritte, 1959
Dallas, Museum for Contemporary Arts & Houston, Museum of Fine Arts, René Magritte in America, 1960-61, no. 65
Little Rock, Arkansas Art Center, Magritte, 1964

Letter from René Magritte to Maurice Rapin, April 14, 1958
José Pierre, Magritte, Paris, 1984, illustrated p. 13
David Sylvester (ed.), Sarah Whitfield & Michael Raeburn, René Magritte, Catalogue Raisonné, Oil Paintings, Objects and Bronzes 1949-1967, vol. III, London, 1993, no. 872, illustrated p. 286

The canvas is unlined and there is no evidence of retouching under ultra-violet light. Apart from two small, very fine hairlines of craquelure in the leaf to the left, this work is in excellent condition. Colors: The colors are fairly accurate in the catalogue illustration.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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L'Okapi explores the single most iconic motif of Magritte's oeuvre, that of the bowler-hatted man. Seen from behind, against an undefined landscape, his head crowned by a mysterious over-sized flower, the protagonist encapsulates the enigmatic, timeless quality that defines Magritte's art.

The image of the bowler-hatted man first appeared in his painting of 1926 titled Rêveries du promeneur solitaire, in which the man is seen from the back, against a dark evening landscape. Used in a number of paintings throughout the artist's career, and most famously in Golconde of 1953, now in the Menil Collection in Houston, the bowler-hatted man appears in various guises. He is sometimes depicted from the back, as in the present work, sometimes from the front, his face obscured by an object placed in front of it, as a dark contour faintly visible against the night sky, or fossilized into a block of stone. Often he is no more than a silhouette, providing a frame in which another subject is depicted. What is common to all of them is the fact that the man remains impersonal, an individual transformed into a universal object. As Suzi Gablik described him: "Magritte's bowler-hatted man is more like a figure in a book than a human being, but a figure with all the inessential elements left out... Impassive and aloof he fixes the world in his gaze, but often his face is turned from view, dislocated, or otherwise concealed or obliterated by objects, as if expressing a universal disinclination, for which there exists no complementary inclination" (Suzi Gablik, Magritte, London, 1991, p. 162).

In L'Okapi, the man's bust occupies the foreground of the composition, as he gazes over the landscape and the plain, cloudless sky, scenery reminiscent of a stage design rather than an actual landscape. Coming from an unknown source above the scene that is depicted, a white flower with three leaves is clasping the man's bowler-hat, and appears to be devouring and protecting him at the same time. The image of the upturned flower is rare within Magritte's oeuvre; while objects such as a loaf of bread, an apple or a bell often appear in his paintings and gouaches, usually obscuring the face of the man, this flower is not repeated in other works. Discussing the significance of another flower, a rose, in a letter of 1957, Magritte wrote: "The presence of the rose next to the walker signifies that the man, wherever his destiny may lead him, is always under the protection of an element of beauty" (quoted in David Sylvester, op. cit., vol. IV, p. 192).

Between 1955 and 1958, Magritte and his friend Maurice Rapin, who was associated with the Surrealist group, corresponded regularly. In a letter of April 14, 1958, Magritte sent Rapin a sketch of the present work, calling it L'Abîme quotidien (The Daily Abyss). At a later stage, however, he changed the title of the work to L'Okapi, adding to its mysterious quality by alluding to the exotic, little known animal. Visually, it might have been the black and white pattern created by the juxtaposition of the man's hat and the flower that reminded Magritte of the stripes that characterize the okapi.

Executed in the last decade of Magritte's life, L'Okapi exemplifies the clarity of thought and execution the artist reached in his mature works. Unlike his earlier paintings, in which he often combined various motifs in a single composition, in his later years Magritte arrived at an economy and purity that allowed him to focus on a single idea, thus creating a stronger visual impact. Whereas in his earlier works the bowler-hatted man's face, or indeed his entire body, are replaced by a landscape or a cloudy sky, in the present work he is reduced to the minimal elements of his generic suit and hat, set against the imaginary landscape which further emphasises the powerfully existential, timeless quality of this image.