Audio Description (02:19)

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Houdini Challenged is a painting created by Deborah Oropallo in 1990. It is 7 feet, 6 inches by 6 feet, 5 inches, and features a small oil on canvas painting collaged onto a larger oil on canvas painting. 

The famed magician Harry Houdini, rendered in greyscale, takes up much of the painting. He is clad in black slacks and a light grey dress shirt, a black bow tie waving under his chin. The magician’s head is back, his lips pressed together, his eyes closed. He is bound to a ladder, ropes tied around each wrist, about his chest and waist, and around his legs.

Six thin, braided, gold ropes have been painted across Houdini’s chest. Though each is of the same thickness, they are of variable length, some long, some short. They slant slightly, sitting higher on the left side of the canvas than on the right. 

The same gold lines, but fainter and longer, stretch across the painting behind Houdini. Those at the top of the artwork are nearly translucent, ghostly. A few hover to the left of the magician’s knee, slightly more solid. And a few, even bolder, rest behind Houdini’s feet. 

A diaphanous red rectangle sits behind Houdini. And layered beneath the rectangle are golden letters that make up words. Some, like “Further,” are familiar, and others, like “U is ig” seem to describe a cypher. They are not painted as vividly as Houdini or the golden ropes; they are somewhat faint, like the lettering on a sign that’s seen a lot of sun.

The words are arranged in straight lines; each line begins with one of the final letters of the alphabet: The top line begins with “S,” the one below it with “T,” the one below that with “U,” and so on, with the bottommost line starting with “Z.” To the left of each line is a fragment of its first letter, faded like a forgotten photocopy. 

Houdini and his ladder, the ropes, rectangle, and letters all float in a space completely devoid of any other figurative elements. The background of the painting features only a gradient of greys and dark blues and yellows, that deepen to a pitch black as the eye moves from left to right.