The Empire of Light
The Empire of Light is a series of paintings René Magritte covered more than a dozen times from 1947 to 1965. They depict the paradoxical image of a nighttime street, lit only by a single street light, beneath a daytime sky. In this case the artist was inspired by the works of John Atkinson Grimshaw, an English painter from the Victorian era, who had delighted in his time to paint urban views at sunset.
The paintings inspired a scene in the 1973 horror film The Exorcist, which was used on the film's posters and home video releases, in which the character Father Merrin stands in front of the MacNeil family's house. It also inspired the artwork for the cover of Jackson Browne's 1974 album Late for the Sky.
