Signed lower right and inscribed with title, oil and mixed media (Dimensions: 78cm x 72cm (30.75in x 28.25in))

(78cm x 72cm (30.75in x 28.25in))

Footnote: Literature: This work was featured on the front cover of 'John Byrne: Art and Life', by Robert Hewison, published by Lund Humphries, 2011. Note: 'Ceci n'est pas un auto-portrait' is a significant work in Byrne's career, as reflected by its inclusion in the artist's retrospective at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and the decision to feature it on the cover of the artist's monograph. The title makes a clear allusion to the famous work 'Ceci n'est pas une pipe' by the Belgian Surrealist master René Magritte, to whom this work is an homage. Byrne was an avid admirer of Magritte which often tells in the whimsical qualities and the quietly uncanny nature of his work. As well as resonating with the older artist's painting in a visual and ideological sense, Byrne also found comfort in the tales of Magritte's early difficulties finding his foothold in the art world. In 1967 when Byrne was in his late twenties, a struggling artist working as a carpet designer in a factory, he penned a letter of admiration to his hero, addressing it simply 'Margritte, Brussels' and dispatching it, probably with little hope, in the post. Extraordinarily, the letter found its way to Magritte, who touchingly took the time to write a supportive response which must have buoyed the young Byrne immensely. “Like you, I have known what it is like to work as a draughtsman in a factory, and I had to paint in the evenings and on Sunday. “ I think each of us has to get through these years of trial, without hope, and without despair. Life for me – now – is ‘easier’, but I know that there is nothing that can necessarily be learned.” Though there were no keys for the "secret of success" to be handed over, there was empathy and solidarity, and encouragement to keep forging on. In the portrait offered here, Byrne depicts himself with an intriguing look in his eyes. There is something at once wild and wise - a knowing nod to Magritte perhaps - that his words had been true and that the artist's road is a long, hard and strange one.