Remarkable sketchbook titled on the cover “Le Probleme du Fantome,” 4 x 5.5, circa 1946, containing 49 original sketches by Magritte in ink and pencil (several back-to-back), six of which are signed in pencil with his last name, “Magritte.” The sketchbook features representations of various subjects in the artist’s recognizable style, including studies of classic Magrittian tropes—among these are a hot air balloon, leaves, faces, landscapes in linear perspective, and hands. About half of the drawings are of ghostlike figures depicted in many different manners, from ghosts shrouded in shadowy darkness to chubby stuffed bedsheets. In overall very good to fine condition, with scattered light creasing and the last page folded along a fragile perforation.
This sketchbook provides fantastic insight into Magritte's creative process, with several of the images closely resembling some of his complete paintings from the 1940s—among the most recognizable are the anthropomorphized leaf as seen in 'The Tempest' (1944) and the horse from 'Pure Reason' (1948). The ghost forms that populate much of the book resemble some of his much earlier work from the late 1920s, including The Invention of Life (1928) and The Lovers I and II (1928), in which human figures are shrouded by white veils and sheets. This sketchbook also dates to the period when Magritte was experimenting with a 'Renoir' style, which he referred to as his 'Sunlit' period, in which he incorporated an impressionistic flavor into his art—a characteristic certainly present in some of these sketches. An exceptionally rare sketchbook containing a wonderful variety of the artist's original work.
