Magritte's surrealist masterpiece is the result of a stroke of pure luck rather than inspiration. The artist was painting a conventional portrait of his friend Pierre Waldorf when an apple fell from a nearby tree, completely obscuring the subject's face.
Lesser artists would simply toss the ruined canvas aside and start again. The face is one of the most important aspects of any portrait, after all. But not Magritte.
"It was a Granny Smith apple," he recalled in later years. "Which was ironic because Waldorf despised Granny Smith apples, claiming they were too sour. He would only eat Golden Delicious apples, and then only if they were sliced up and added to a salad with walnuts and celery. So I called the painting Granny Smith's Revenge."
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