Les eaux profondes

A quintessential Surrealist painting by René Magritte depicting a figure wearing a dark double-breasted overcoat topped with a classical white marble female bust, standing before a stone wall with a turquoise sea visible to the left. Perched on a weathered wooden stump to the right is a large dark bird — likely a raven or jackdaw — facing the marble head in an uncanny confrontation. The juxtaposition of the animate bird, inanimate sculpture, and clothed human form exemplifies Magritte's signature dislocation of familiar objects. Painted in 1941 during the German occupation of Belgium, the work carries an enigmatic tension characteristic of Magritte's wartime output.