this is my personal favorite of the works i completed last year, in no small part because the idea 'came out whole', which is always refreshing! it was inspired by a walk my wife and i had the previous fall during which we stumbled upon a couple of trees that had fallen together to create a perfect arch. my first thought was "that is just what a magical gateway would look like: completely invisible to the casual passerby, needing only the proximity of a magical creature to activate it."
it was done in painter 8 and completed within a week though i can't recall how many hours it took.