Raphaelle Peale
To be honest, I had never expected that I would find such a perfect (and a bit surreal) Magritte-style painting from ... the 19th century.
Raphaelle Peale is considered the first professional American painter of still lifes. The painting we present today is atypical of Peale's oeuvre. Most of his works are conventional still lifes rather than outright deceptions. Still, it is undoubtedly his most famous work and the painting most responsible for the revival of his reputation in the 20th century.
Peale began painting deceptions, as trompe l'oeil paintings were then known, as early as 1795; only three such still lifes by him, however, are currently known to exist. The painting you see today depicts a dazzling white linen cloth pinned to a tape, which is seemingly attached to the top edge of the canvas. Dark shadows around its edges and under the tape suggest a flat, painted background. In fact, the cloth appears to be hiding a painting of a woman whose bare left arm, holding a lock of golden hair, and right foot extends above and below its margins. The scholars found out that this partially depicted nude is a copy of The Birth of Venus, a painting by the Irish artist James Barry, which had enjoyed great acclaim and wide popularity at the time. Analysis has also shown that Peale did not paint the rest of the woman under the cloth.
Never trust art!
P.S. Here are the 14 weirdest paintings by René Magritte. Check them out!
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