Magritte at Gagosian

Tomorrow, Gagosian opens a London exhibition that treats René Magritte as more than a completed chapter of Surrealism. Organised with the Fondation Magritte, This Is Still Not a Pipe: The Afterlife of Magritte brings together paintings, works on paper and sculptures from across his career. Alongside them are works by more than forty artists of different generations, including pieces made specifically for the exhibition. The question is what remains active in Magritte’s way of thinking through images—and what merely borrows his instantly recognisable motifs.

The selection reaches beyond the familiar pipes, apples and bowler hats. Announced loans include Les Fleurs du voyage (1926), shown in Magritte’s first solo exhibition in Brussels, as well as La Clef des songes and La Lampe philosophique from the 1930s. Such works suggest that his influence cannot be reduced to a stock of recognisable symbols. Magritte’s paintings unsettle the relationship between an object, its name and our certainty that we have understood it. Whether the contemporary responses take up that uncertainty or rely chiefly on his images’ familiarity will become clear in the exhibition itself.

The venue matters, too. With loans and an international roster of artists, a gallery such as Gagosian can put forward an art-historical argument on a scale associated with a major institution. At the same time, the pairing brings attention and value to the contemporary art it presents. That does not make the exhibition less relevant; it makes its setting part of the story. Anyone presenting Magritte’s “afterlife” helps determine which artists will be seen as his heirs. DOKUNST will judge that proposition against the works.

Exhibition: This Is Still Not a Pipe: The Afterlife of Magritte, Gagosian, 20 Grosvenor Hill, London, 24 September–12 December 2026.

René Magritte, photographed on 18 October 1961. Photographer unknown. Musée Carnavalet – Histoire de Paris / Paris Musées collection, CC0 1.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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