The Treachery of Images

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The Treachery of Images (French: La trahison des images, 1928–29, sometimes translated as The Treason of Images) is a painting by the Belgian surrealist painter René Magritte, painted when Magritte was 30 years old. The picture shows a pipe. Below it, Magritte painted, "Ceci n'est pas une pipe." [sə.si ne paz‿yn pip], French for "This is not a pipe."

"The famous pipe. How people reproached me for it! And yet, could you stuff my pipe? No, it's just a representation, is it not? So if I had written on my picture 'This is a pipe', I'd have been lying!"

His statement is taken to mean that the painting itself is not a pipe. The painting is merely an image of a pipe. Hence, the description, "this is not a pipe." The theme of pipes with the text "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" is extended in his 1966 painting, Les Deux Mystères. It is currently on display at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. The painting is sometimes given as an example of meta message conveyed by paralanguage. Compare with Korzybski's "The word is not the thing" and "The map is not the territory".