The Treachery of Images[]
This is not a pipe.
The Treachery of Images is a painting by the Belgian artist René Margritte. The picture shows a pipe. Below it, Magritte painted, "Ceci n'est pas une pipe.", French for "This is not a pipe."
- "The famous pipe. How people reproached me for it! And yet, could you stuff my pipe? No, it's just a representation, is it not? So if I had written on my picture "This is a pipe", I'd have been lying!"
His statement is taken to mean that the painting itself is not a pipe; the painting is only an image of a pipe. Hence, the description, "this is not a pipe."