History Main / ConcealingCanvas

This is ridiculously common in InteractiveFiction and {{Point And Click Game}}s.

* In ''Series/BrodreneDal and the Mystery of Karl XII's Spats'', the brothers have a painting of a safe on the wall that conceals a real safe behind it.
* In ''Series/ResidentAlien'', Abigail Hodges is arrested for the murder of her husband but is later released pending trial. She holds a yard sale and Sheriff Mike Thompson takes a call from a man who tells him to shut it down, that it's a "murder sale." Thompson dismisses the man for wasting police time, as Abigail is well within her rights to hold a sale. He later offers to buy a set of mystery novels that Sam Hodges once tried to give him, only for her to tell him that if Sam wanted him to have them, he should. He begins to suspect based on her demeanor that he may have arrested the wrong suspect, something that Deputy Liv Baker agrees with. He starts reading the novels and discovers that the detective in them would hide clues behind the backings of paintings. Based on this, he and Deputy Liv examine Sam Hodges's office and discover a note in the backing of one of the paintings with a list of names headed "Galvan/Powell," which [[DramaticIrony viewers already know was the company behind Sam Hodges's death.]]

* ''TabletopGame/{{Champions}}''. ''Magazine/SpaceGamerFantasyGamer'' magazine #78 scenario "The Jewel Thief". The title {{NPC}} scales the outside of a skyscraper and enters through a window. Once inside the room he goes to a painting on the wall, pulls it back and reveals a safe hidden behind it. He tries to open the safe and steal the jewels inside, hopefully to be stopped by the superhero PlayerCharacter.
* ''TabletopGame/{{Aftermath}}}'', ''Scenario Pack 1: Into the Ruins''. In the ruins of the Gatlin Center, the Director's office has a wall safe hidden behind a picture. The safe holds a variety of papers regarding the Center's operations, $5,000 in $10 bills, a packet of love letters and a vial of deadly poison.

* One of the first levels of the first ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'' featured this.

* Dr. Fred's safe in ''VideoGame/ManiacMansion'' and ''VideoGame/DayOfTheTentacle'' is hidden behind a portrait of him, with hair.

* ''VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue'': The switch to open a secret door lies behind a poster in the Celadon Game Corner.
* In ''VideoGame/CovertAction'' safes are obvious, but in some objects the {{Player Character}} can hide bugs in break-in mode, and painting on the wall is one of them: turn it, plant a bug, turn it back. Also you see the guards walking around sometimes quickly opening and closing those paintings, presumably to check for bugs some "inventive" spy always may leave behind.
* Used in the ''Franchise/BaldursGate'' series of [=CRPG=]s, mainly by inferring that there are secret compartments behind clickable paintings. Subverted once in ''[[VideoGame/BaldursGateII Shadows of Amn]]'', however: attempting to pick a locked door in a thieves' guild would reveal that it's just an incredibly elaborate painting with a doorknob attached.
* It's probably easier to list the [[PointAndClickGame Room Escape]] games that ''don't'' use this trope.
* ''VideoGame/MedalOfHonorFrontline'': In the manor level, there is a map hidden behind a painting and documents in a cuckoo clock that you need to find. The problem being, [[NeedleInAStackOfNeedles there are dozens of paintings and clocks throughout the manor]], only one of which has what you're looking for.
* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind'': There is a secret door hidden behind a tapestry in Venim Manor. [[spoiler: You'll need to rescue someone from this hidden room to advance in the House Redoran and Redoran Hortator questlines]].
* In ''VisualNovel/AceAttorneyInvestigations'', each prosecutor's office contains a wall safe meant to store evidence needed for trials. Edgeworth hides his behind the suit jacket and [[WaistcoatOfStyle vest]] he keeps framed and hanging on his wall.
* One of the easiest ways to hide a treasure stash in ''VideoGame/{{Minecraft}}'' is to make an adjacent room and hide it behind a 12x12 painting. Preferably you'll have an iron door behind it and the room itself blocked with obsidian, [[OpenSecret because this technique is so old it's pretty much the first thing people think of when they see said giant paintings.]]
* In ''VideoGame/{{Penumbra}}: Black Plague'', an AirVentPassageway is hidden behind an odd painting.
* ''VideoGame/PAYDAY2'':
** In the Big Bank heist, there's always a safe hidden behind a painting in the bank manager's office. It sometimes holds a keycard necessary to open a security door, though there's usually just a partially-eaten sandwich inside.
** The Golden Grin Casino heist features a safe behind a painting in the manager's office, which must be opened to find one of three parts of a code lock. The painting itself can be taken as loot.
* ''VideoGame/{{Scratches}}'' has a safe hidden behind a painting in the master bedroom.
* In ''VideoGame/DarkFall: Light's Out'', the button to open a hidden drawer is hidden behind the corner of a painting in the head lighthouse-keeper's room.
* The Crabb & Sons company in ''VideoGame/{{Safecracker}}'' lampshade and joke about this trope in a pamphlet in-game. Given that what they produce ''is'' safes, barely any of the safes at their corporate headquarters are hidden.
--> "No longer is it the case of looking behind the right painting. Now the crack thief will be down on his hands and knees, touching and prodding at everything he sees in hopes of getting lucky."
** The 2006 successor plays with this, with a painting that ''does'' hide a safe, except there are other paintings connected by wires that have to be rearranged in the right order before the one with the safe will open.
* In ''VideoGame/AmnesiaAMachineForPigs'', there is a lever behind a painting in one of the bathrooms that opens a secret door.
* In ''VideoGame/KathyRain'', there is a safe behind the painting in Isaac's room at the church.

* ''VideoGame/TheSexyBrutale'' has a safe hidden behind a painting. The master lockpicker snarkily remarks that it's a new and original idea.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': In "Onion Friend", Onion takes Steven to a room behind his poster, only accessible through a long air vent.

* Non-safe (unsafe?) example: Vlad Masters of ''WesternAnimation/DannyPhantom'' hides a portal to the ghost zone behind a painting of himself. On the other hand, the Ghost Zone side of the portal is "concealed" behind ''[[RefugeInAudacity a giant]] [[RuleOfFunny football]]''. Vlad, by the way, is a massive Green Bay Packers fan.
* ''WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck'' hides a safe behind a family portrait at home. [[spoiler:This works until the safe itself runs away.]] He also has another of these, holding his case files, in his secret lair.
* In the ''WesternAnimation/HuntikSecretsAndSeekers'' episode "An Ally From The Organization", [[ExBigBad the Professor]] is revealed to have been suspicious of his NumberTwo [[DragonWithAnAgenda Rassimov]] and secretly kept files about Rassimov’s weaknesses in a locked safe behind a painting in his office.

* One ''Caldwell'' strip depicts two men on a FarSideIsland with a portrait hanging on the palm tree. The second man accuses the first of keeping all the coconuts in a hidden safe.

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11123742/13/The-Vanishing-Cabinet-Of-Time The Vanishing Cabinet of Time]]'' Dumbledore keeps his old wand in a safe behind a portrait of the previous Headmaster.
* A sidestory of ''Fanfic/PokemonResetBloodlines'' reveals that Giovanni has a safe in his office, hidden behind a portrait of himself and his Persian. Inside he stashes many items that might not see the light of day in a long time, but are too valuable to destroy.
* ''Fanfic/RobbReturns'': Behind a tapestry in Ned's own solar, right under his nose, there is a hidden door that leads to a whole room of secrets, including the Fist of Winter and the relic that triggers the Call.
* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10449282/9/Oh-Hell-No Oh Hell No]]'' Amelia has a safe which is invisible unless you "open" the painting in front of it as if it were a door.

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/8076284/17/Harry-Potter-And-The-Bonds-Of-Time Harry Potter and the Bonds of Time]]'' Amelia has a safe behind a portrait of her late brother Edgar.
* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13939231/4/Betrothed Betrothed]]'' Ted has one in his law office which is charmed so only people on an "approved" list can open it.

[[folder:Films -- Animated]]

[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]

** ''Film/{{Thunderball}}'' has a secret map behind a painting, showing top-secret locations.

* There's a safe behind a painting of Hitler in the movie ''Film/{{Valkyrie}}''.

* ''Franchise/ThePinkPanther'' has a double-ended safe behind two paintings.

* In ''Film/TheCobbler'', one of the baddies has a safe behind his bathroom mirror where he stores precious watches.
* ''Film/HudsonHawk''. The auction house Eddie and Tommy break into hides its safe behind a large painting. The safe holds the "Sforza", the horse statuette that they're there to steal.
* ''Film/TheClimax'': Hidden behind a painting in his office, Dr. Hohner has a safe that contains his souvenirs of all of Marcellina's performances.

* In ''Literature/TheThreeInvestigators'' volume ''The Case of the Weeping Coffin'', the eccentric millionaire's house is littered with these, to the point that the curtain that doesn't conceal a safe is interesting.

* ''Literature/TheExecutioner'': In "Terminal Velocity", Mack Bolan breaks into a safe hidden in the office of a KGB honcho, but thanks to a continuity error it changes from a picture of Lenin to one of Brezhnev, then back again.
* In ''Literature/TheFlyingCloud'', while exploring an abandoned base of the Fat Man's group, Wilcox and Mackiernan find a movie poster in the main office that they instantly identify as this trope. It was also booby-trapped with a massive concrete deadfall, but they had already encountered so many traps in that base that this one was no surprise.
* In ''Literature/ExperimentalFilm'', the mentally disabled child Hyatt Whitcomb used to sleep in a crib with his nanny in a bed next to him so he couldn't wander off, but he kicked loose a panel in the wall next to his crib, revealing a ladder-way built to make it easier to clean the flue. He tacked up some sketches over the opening so he could use it to sneak out at night. His mother never found out until after his disappearance.

* In season 3 of ''Series/{{Heroes}}'', [[spoiler:a stolen formula is hidden behind the Mona Lisa]].
* An episode of ''Series/TheMonkees'' had a safe, behind a painting of a safe, behind a painting. That is, the "regular" painting was removed from the wall to show a painting of a safe, which was removed to show a real safe.
* ''Series/{{Lost}}'': Ben Linus keeps all his information on Charles Widmore in a wall safe behind a painting.
* ''Series/{{Leverage}}'':
** Hardison has hidden large quantities of cash inside the frame of his painting of Harlan Leverage III (AKA Old Nate).
** In "The Fairy Godparents Job," the [[TheCon mark]] has a safe hidden behind a painting in his swanky apartment.
* Played with on ''Series/BurnNotice''.
** In one episode, an art dealer has hung a stolen painting on the wall and covered it with another, larger, painting.
** In another, an assassin hides a disc of sensitive data ''inside'' the wall - concealing the hiding place with a layer of plaster.
** In a few episodes it's noted that it's foolish to hide things in those places and suggested that the best places to hide small things of value are behind door hinges (unscrewed and hollowed out) and that the best places to hide bugs are behind receptacle covers because no one looks there and there is a steady source of power.

* At least once in ''Series/{{Alias}}'': Vaughn goes to Virginia to his wife's mother's house and has to steal a code. The code is in a safe on the wall behind a painting, and the painting even has hinges on the right side attaching it to the wall and facilitating access to the safe.
* ''Series/DoctorWho'' had variations on this from time to time. In "The War Games," for example, a painting in the World War I general's quarters concealed his SIDRAT (a knockoff TARDIS) controls. In "The Five Doctors", a door could only be opened by playing a tune on Rassilon's harp. A nearby painting of Rassilon playing that harp showed the tune.

* Interestingly inverted on ''Series/{{Hustle}}''. Their mark had stolen a new security system that was effectively unbeatable and was now marketing it by offering to secure a painting and cover the theft liability without insurance. Because the system couldn't be defeated due to being sewn into the painting itself, they build a false wall in front of it to avoid detection and blackmail the mark with his "stolen" painting due to the fact that the mark would be liable for the multimillion quid cost.

* In the ''Series/UFO1970'' episode "Exposed", Paul Foster breaks into the Ventura Aircraft Corporation to find evidence that he saw a UFO. He looks behind several paintings on a wall and eventually pulls one back, revealing a safe hidden behind it.

* An improvised version in ''Series/AgentCarter''. When Peggy Carter has to hide a MacGuffin in her rented apartment, she knocks a hole in the wall, takes out a couple of bricks so she can place the device in the wall-space, then hangs a picture over the damage.
* Parodied on ''Series/MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'' in the episode "Dennis Moore" where a safe is hidden behind... a painting of a safe.

* In the ''Series/HoneyWest'' episode "The Owl and the Eye," a thief hides the [[MacGuffin Ming Owl]] behind a portrait of his mother.
* ''Series/DeadMansGun'': No safe, but in "The Highwayman", Robert Cosgrove has a hole in his bedroom wall where he conceals the eponymous gun and his ill-gotten gains that is hidden behind a painting.
* ''Series/TheBionicWoman'' episode "Black Magic". A dying man hides his will in a wall safe concealed behind a painting.

* During the "Seven Mysteries of Fudo High" case in ''Manga/TheKindaichiCaseFiles'', the unknown seventh mystery (according to legend, whoever discovers it will be cursed) is revealed to be an actual corpse buried in the wall of an old schoolbuilding, obscured by an otherwise-hideous poster. This ties into the old schoolbuilding's DarkSecret (it used to be a lab for a shady pharmaceutical company before donating it to the school).

* In ''WesternAnimation/TurningRed'', the scroll which tells the tale of Sun Yee and the Red Panda Blessing is [[spoiler:kept in a secret compartment in the temple, concealed behind a painting of Sun Yee]].

** ''Film/{{Thunderball}}'' has a secret map behind a painting, showing top secret locations.

** In ''Film/TomorrowNeverDies'', Bond searches Elliot Carver's office for GPS encoder. After having no luck at first, he sits down and contemplates an illuminated picture of Carver's satellite on the wall--sure enough, it swings out to reveal a safe.

* In ''VideoGame/CovertAction'' safes are obvious, but in some objects the {{Player Character}} can hide bugs in break-in mode, and painting on the wall is one of them: turn it, plant a bug, turn it back. Also you see the guards walking around sometimes quickly open and close those paintings, presumably to check for bugs some "inventive" spy always may leave behind.