Door 1992

Basil Beattie's "Door," an evocative work residing here at the Tate Modern, presents us with a potent symbol – the doorway. Throughout history, the door has served as a critical motif. From ancient Egyptian tomb paintings depicting the passage to the afterlife, to the Roman deity Janus, guardian of doorways and transitions, it represents both opening and closure, the known and unknown. Consider the threshold, that sacred space where one world ends and another begins, pregnant with possibility, yet also fraught with anxiety. Beattie’s treatment, with its turbulent blues, evokes a visceral, psychological landscape. The very act of depiction here becomes a ritual of passage, a struggle to confront the void. We are drawn to it, subconsciously yearning for what lies beyond, yet simultaneously held back by primal fears of the uncertain. Like the ouroboros, the serpent eating its own tail, the symbol of the door undergoes a cyclical transformation, constantly reappearing in our collective consciousness, forever altered and imbued with new meaning, a testament to its enduring power.