Lavina Blossom 

After

on Magritte’s “The Balcony” in red chalk

A study for a painting he would later execute.
After Manet’s “The Balcony,” figures behind
a balcony railing.  Magritte’s “figures” not in finery
like Manet’s women in floor-length white
satin, a suit and tie for the gent—but all
in wood grain with rivet edging—caskets
straight or bent (one of them in a chair), their
final covering become them.  Coffin-
rigid, the boy in the background shadows, part of
a shadow family portrayed at a height.
Yet no railing can protect them from
descent--from virus or accident or
natural death.  Smoothly planed and polished,
nonetheless.  No body part revealed, and yet
clearly human, their fate and future sealed.

Art Institute of Chicago 1 -2-3-4

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