LUMINARIA

Christa Zaat

René François Ghislain Magritte (Belgian surrealist artist) 1898 - 1967
Het Rijk der Lichten (L'Empire des Lumières) (The Empire of Light), 1954
oil on canvas
signed l.r. magritte
146 x 114 cm.
Royal Museums of Fine Arts, Brussels, Belgium

Het Rijk der Lichten (L'Empire des Lumieres) is a 1954 painting by the Belgian surrealist painter René Magritte. It belongs to the most famous works of the painter, although there are many versions. The Musée Magritte Museum also has a version from 1961.
Other versions are in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art and Guggenheim in New York.

The painting shows the surprising image of a night scene in the lower part, while above a radiant light cloudy sky is shown. Some windows of the house depicted are lit, a lantern is reflected in a pond. Two logical images in the painting to an illogical united whole, making a surprising effect.

Magritte himself commented: "This evocation of night and day seems to have to surprise us and cheer I call this force the power poetry.."

The original title ‘L’Empire des Lumieres’, taken from a poem by Paul Nouge. It is the only time that Magritte used a title that was not his own.