René Magritte’s 1953 painting depicting bowler-hatted men raining over a city is titled Golconda.
The image shows numerous nearly identical men suspended in the sky above rooftops. They appear evenly spaced, as if falling, floating, or existing in a precise visual pattern. Their repeated clothing makes them seem both ordinary and uncanny, a characteristic effect in Magritte’s work.
Magritte often used familiar objects and figures while removing the normal explanations that make them understandable. In Golconda, the bowler hat suggests a conventional middle-class man, but the men’s impossible arrangement turns that everyday figure into a visual paradox.
The title refers to Golconda, a historic city in India associated with wealth and diamonds. Magritte’s image is not a literal illustration of that place. The painting is also sometimes described simply as “the raining men” image, but Golconda is its established title.