A portal has opened · guest entrance no. unknown
You were not looking for this place. Nevertheless, it appears to have found you.
Mortis Canvas occupies the space between dreamspace and reality. Mr. Mortis dreams faster than ordinary dimensions can contain. Mr. Phobos builds the mansion around whatever escapes.
To our unexpected guest,
Welcome. You appear to be lost. This is unfortunate, but not unprecedented.
The house is safe enough when treated politely. I regret to inform you that departure remains theoretical. I am working on the physics.
Please make yourself comfortable in the meantime.
Mr. Phobos
Custodian, architect, increasingly tired experimentalist
KaiHouse dragon · friendly · very small · unsupervised
LunaMr. Mortis's companion · warm · assessing you
Mansion directory
The house is older than most of its architecture and younger than several of its rooms. Mr. Phobos recommends ignoring this.
A sheltered antechamber before the first public gallery wing, with the exhibition introduction, the Wax Sanctuary and a quieter place to gather yourself.
Enter the alcove → Locked · under construction 2025 The next wingThe corridor exists. Scaffolding, unfinished rooms and an alarming quantity of fresh masonry remain.
Structural access only ⌁ Locked · expanding 2026 Further into the houseMr. Mortis is still producing the problem faster than Mr. Phobos can construct the solution.
Please mind the dust ⌁Beyond off limits. No exceptions. No jokes. Do not wake Mr. Mortis.
Blueprints, exit experiments, wax, ledgers and machinery from whichever century solved the latest problem.
If this door appears open, it is not. Find Mr. Phobos. Do not congratulate Luna.
How the house survives
I
He lives in a perpetual dream. His paintings are not illustrations of that world but windows punched clean through to it. When he occasionally wakes, the mansion has already expanded around everything he dreamed before.
He is protective of the lost souls wandering his halls, amused by them, mildly confused by them and generally delighted that somebody came to look.
II
He cannot perceive dreamspace itself. He can only perceive its consequences, particularly the paintings. So he builds walls, rooms, seals, archives and entire wings to take pressure off his friend.
Once human, now something less easily filed. He dresses as an eighteenth-century gentleman because his earlier centuries have largely become somebody else's history.
III
An impossible landscape replaces stone. Geometry loosens. Luna becomes delighted. Kai becomes very attentive. Mr. Phobos loses every trace of colour and begins sealing doors.
It is the only part of the mansion he genuinely fears.
Windows in the wall
Every painting is a view beyond the physical. Some windows remain open. Some have found keepers. Some have been sealed forever.
Pinned beside the stairs
Please do not follow Kai into unfinished corridors. He knows better. This has not helped.
P.Guests are reminded that the mansion is not technically a prison. I am aware this distinction currently lacks practical value.
Office of Spatial ExperimentsIf Luna is pleased by an impossible landscape, you should not be.
P.A matter of departure
Sold paintings have left the mansion in the company of lost souls brave enough to test Mr. Phobos's exit theories. He believes they are scattered somewhere beyond the house. He cannot yet prove they survived the crossing.
There is one encouraging rumour: an anonymous traveller appears to have become particularly prolific and carried away five works from The Great Atrocities of 2024. Mr. Phobos refuses to call this evidence.
The 2024 passage is open
The Grand Hall opens first into a sheltered alcove. It contains the exhibition introduction and the Wax Sanctuary; the Great Atrocities gallery waits through the next door.
Enter the 2024 Alcove
