Poetry and Painting: Connections

Before we get into everything, I would like to say that surrealism is, in my humble opinion, the greatest art movement of modern times (post-1900), and Rene Magritte is one of my favorite artists of all time. I think his surrealist works are some of the greatest pieces of art to come from the movement, if not the 20^th century. So after reading this, everyone should go check him out.

I also think it’s best to spend a few minutes reading the poem and viewing the painting before reading this post because I reference them heavily. (Both are below for your convenience as well.)

Now, the analysis.

Rene Margritte’s The beautiful relations (1967) is a painting I’ve been fond of for some time. I think I discovered it sometime in freshman year. Then, I thought it was sad and lonely. Now, I think it's still lonely but more melancholy.  Perhaps it's the single air-balloon or the single eye; these things which usually come in pairs coming alone. Or rather, I guess they’re coming together—but they don’t fit. Eyes are not balloons and a balloon, though it can give a birds-eye view, can never be one’s only perspective on the world. Thus, that they’re being portrayed as one, the two eyes of the face, just seems off—like it should work but it doesn’t.

Similarly, the speaker of Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz’s “Not Doing Something Wrong Isn’t the Same as Doing Something Right” tells of a night which should have worked but didn’t. They recount what can be assumed to be a one-night stand which was supposed to “save” them in some way. It didn’t if the way they’re constantly defending their actions says anything. I think that the trouble was between the speaker’s lack of a body, or conscious acknowledgement of one, and their partner’s solid understanding of their own. This difference created an image which mimics the one in The beautiful relations: two unlike things trying to be one.

In the poem it’s a body-less female and a full-bodied male trying to save the speaker from numbness. While in the painting it’s an eye and balloon trying to be eyes. In theory, both situations should work but in practice you just can’t put them together.

The other way I read both the poem and painting as one is in the image conveyed. This is perhaps their biggest link and I’d be remiss to not mention it. Both portray a body-less woman. You could probably read more into this idea. Perhaps looking at the air-balloon being an image of the speaker’s desire to take flight from their current state. I can also see a valid argument about the red lipstick of the painting representing the desire in Aptowicz’s poem. Regardless, I do believe that the speaker of the poem is portrayed by the face of the painting.

Beyond these links I think that The beautiful relations and “Not Doing Something Wrong Isn’t the Same as Doing Something Right” and their connections are a great example of how art of two completely different mediums, paint and poetry, can come together to create something even greater for the viewer. I think that might be the true beauty of art.

Rene Margritte, The Beautiful relations (1967)

Not Doing Something Wrong Isn't the Same as Doing Something Right

Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz

In my defense, my forgotten breasts. In my defense, the hair

no one brushed from my face. In my defense, my hips.

Months earlier, I remember thinking that sex was a ship retreating

on the horizon. I could do nothing but shove my feet in the sand.

I missed all the things loneliness taught me: eyes that follow you

crossing a room, hands that find their home on you. To be noticed, even.

In my defense, his hands. In my defense, his arms. In my defense,

how when we just sat listening to each other breathe, he said, This is enough.

My body was a house I had closed for the winter. It shouldn’t have been

that difficult, empty as it was. Still, I stared hard as I snapped off the lights.

My body was a specter that haunted me, appearing when I stripped

in the bathroom, when I crawled into empty beds, when it rained.

My body was abandoned construction, restoration scaffolding

that became permanent. My body’s unfinished became its finished.

So in my defense, when he touched me, the lights of my body came on.

In my defense, the windows were thrown open. In my defense, spring.

- Tina