A picture of a door does something no other subject does. It tells you that the picture has a far side, and that you could go there. Gates, arches, tunnels, mirrors, rings of light: artists have drawn them for as long as there has been art, and they are everywhere in fantasy and science fiction now. This post looks at why.
The threshold
A doorway is a border between two places. Standing in it, you are in neither. People have always treated that in-between position as important.
The Romans had a god for it. Janus was the god of doors, gates and beginnings, shown with two faces, one looking each way. The month of January is named after him, as the doorway of the year. Many cultures have customs about thresholds: carrying a bride across one, hanging charms above one, removing shoes at one. Anthropologists use the word liminal, from the Latin for threshold, for any state of being between one thing and the next. See liminal spaces explained.
So a doorway in a picture is seldom only a doorway. It stands for a change.
Doors in older art
- Egyptian false doors. Tombs had a door carved in solid stone, which could not open. It was for the spirit of the dead, who could pass through it to receive offerings.
- Gates of paradise. In Christian art, heaven has a gate and hell has a mouth. The gilded bronze doors that Lorenzo Ghiberti made for the Baptistery in Florence in the fifteenth century were called the Gates of Paradise.
- Torii. In Japan, a torii gate marks the entrance to a Shinto shrine. It has no doors and no walls. Walking through it takes you from ordinary ground to sacred ground.
- Moon gates. In Chinese gardens, a round opening in a wall frames the view beyond like a picture.
- The window in a painting. Renaissance painters described a picture as a window onto another world. Dutch painters of the 1600s loved to show one room seen through the doorway of another.
- The Romantic view. Caspar David Friedrich painted figures at windows and ruined arches opening on to sky. The frame within the frame became a picture of longing.
Doors that lead somewhere impossible
In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the door became a way into other worlds.
- The looking glass and the rabbit hole in Lewis Carroll's Alice books.
- The wardrobe in C. S. Lewis's Narnia stories.
- The surrealists. René Magritte painted doors standing alone in landscapes, and doors with a hole the shape of a person cut through them.
- The stargate and the wormhole in science fiction: a ring that opens on another planet.
- Games. Portals are everywhere in games: the glowing ring that takes you to the next level, the door between worlds.
Fantasy stories in which a person from our world passes into another have a name, portal fantasy. The door is the whole premise.
What a portal means
- Possibility. There is more than what you can see from here.
- Change. A new stage of life, a decision, a beginning.
- Escape. A way out of the ordinary.
- The unknown. You can't see what is on the other side. That is exciting or frightening, according to how it is drawn.
- Invitation. An open door asks you to come in.
- Death and rebirth. In many traditions, dying is described as passing through a door.
How artists draw them
- Light beyond. The far side is brighter than the near side. The eye goes to light, so you are pulled through. A dark doorway does the opposite and warns you off.
- A path leading to it. A road, a river or a corridor carries you to the opening.
- A frame within the frame. Trees, rock or architecture close in round the opening and point at it.
- The circle. Many portals are rings. A circle has no beginning or end, and it reads as complete and otherworldly.
- A small figure. One person in front of a large gateway gives it scale, and gives you someone to stand in for.
- The spiral. A tunnel turning into the distance suggests travel.
Portal pieces at Kiyo Arts
- Lost Forest Magic Portal. A ring of light at the end of a forest path, under a purple canopy. It uses nearly every device on the list above: the path, the frame of trees, the circle and the light beyond. It is a classic portal fantasy image.
- Purple Pink Wormhole. A purple and pink spiral turning into a black centre. The science fiction version. See black holes and wormholes.
- Geometry Portal. An abstract in pale blue, white and red: a portal reduced to shapes.
- Cosmic Deer. An avenue of snowy trees with white light at its far end, and a stag standing in the way. It is a threshold picture, with a guardian.
- Cyber Wave Escape. A grid running to a horizon. The road out.
Why a portal works on a wall
A wall is a flat, closed surface. A picture of an opening undoes that. It gives the room a way out.
- It adds depth. A picture with a strong vanishing point makes a room feel larger.
- It suits a room without a view. A basement, an interior room, a wall that faces a brick wall.
- It gives the eye somewhere to go when you look up from a screen.
- It holds attention. People look at a doorway longer than at most subjects, because they are trying to see through it.
Where to hang one
- At the end of a hallway. This is the best place there is. A corridor already leads the eye to its end wall. Put a portal there and the hall seems to go on. See hallway and entryway wall art.
- Above a desk. An escape for the eyes, and for the mind.
- In a reading corner. A doorway to somewhere else, beside the books that do the same.
- In a games room, especially one used for tabletop role-playing games.
- On a narrow wall. Portal pictures are often tall, and they suit the shape of a door.
- Opposite a real doorway, so that you see it as you come in.
Hang it at eye level and centred, like a door. A portal hung high or off to one side loses the effect. Give it some clear wall on each side. See how high to hang wall art.
Lighting it
A portal picture usually has a bright centre. Soft light from the front or the side lets that glow. An LED strip behind a canvas, set to the colour of the light in the picture, makes it look as though the light is coming through the wall. See how to light wall art with LED strips.
As a gift
A doorway is a good present for someone at a threshold of their own: a graduate, someone moving house, someone starting a new job or a new chapter. It says there is something ahead. See graduation gifts and housewarming gifts.
For more fantasy landscapes, see enchanted forest art and sci-fi landscape canvas. Browse the canvas art collection.