Magritte painted The Son of Man as a self-portrait. The painting consists of a man in an overcoat and a bowler hat standing in front of a short wall, beyond which is the sea and a cloudy sky. The man's face is largely obscured by a hovering green apple. However, the man's eyes can be seen peeking over the edge of the apple. Another subtle feature is that the man's left arm appears to bend backward at the elbow.

Surrealism aimed to transcend the realist depiction of scenes available to ordinary perception. Under the influence of the new discipline of psychoanalysis, surrealists made use of such techniques as dream analysis to uncover the unconscious workings of the mind and the symbols that the unconscious works with. Not much of Magritte's oeuvre consists of literally inconsistent images, but at least one famous image does, The Blank Signature.

The Lovers II (1928), is an oil on canvas depicting two individuals locked in an embrace. The figures are kissing one another through veils. They are situated in a room with the back wall, side wall and ceiling showing. The back wall is blue-grey with a lighter shade on the bottom half and a darker shade on the top half. The side wall is brick red with it lighter at the bottom blending to a darker shade through to the top. The ceiling is white and has a decorative trim along the border of the red wall, but it does not continue along the border of the blue-grey wall. The male figure wears a black suit and tie with a solid white shirt. He embraces a woman clad in a red, sleeveless garment with white trim. The woman's tanned arm is exposed. The man is in a dominant position relative to the woman. She tilts her head up while he leans down to kiss. Both figures have a whitish veil completely covering their faces and necks. On both figures the veils are tight against the front of the face and top of the head and then relax towards the back. The woman's face is tilted slightly to the left making her lover more prominent and revealing the distinct outline of his nose