The Lie was The Door

The Lie Was the Door by Anthony Carey, a textured blue mixed-media painting with a small red recess cut into the canvas.
  • Close-up of the red recessed opening and heavily layered blue surface in The Lie Was the Door.

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  • Angled detail showing the depth of the red recess cut into the textured surface of The Lie Was the Door.

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About the work

The Lie Was the Door developed from an accidental change to the canvas. What first appeared to be damage suggested an opening, and I began constructing a small recess behind the surface. Painted red and set within layers of heavily worked blue, it resembles a doorway while offering no possibility of passage.


As I worked, the false opening became connected with political dishonesty and the systems of power that present access, choice and opportunity while ensuring that many people remain excluded. We are repeatedly shown a way forward, only to discover that the promised entrance leads nowhere—or was never intended to open for us at all.


The physical depth of the recess is important. It appears to offer somewhere beyond the painted surface, but the closer we come, the more clearly its refusal is revealed. The door exists. The possibility it represents does not.


Artwork details
2025
Acrylic and plaster on canvas
25 × 35 cm


Availability on request →