Portrait (Harry Potter)

Portraits were paintings made of certain individuals, namely witches and wizards.The subject of a magical portrait was sentient due to enchantments placed on the portrait by the painter. The portrait would be able to use some of the subject's favourite phrases and imitate their general demeanour based on how the subject appeared to the painter; however, they were limited in what they could say or do. A portrait could also move from portrait to portrait, or else visit a portrait of them elsewhere in the world.Bimp, Oliver Cartwright, John Homme, Luxo Karuzos, Pablo Picasso and Leonardo Da Vinci were all expert painters. Magenta Comstock was an experimental painter whose subjects' eyes followed their viewers home.
==Depiction==
A witch or wizard could go to a wizarding painter to have themselves painted. This was usually done so that the portraitist could enchant the portrait to have some characteristics of the subject. The portrait would be able to use some of the subject's favourite phrases and imitate their general demeanour. Private individuals might place their portrait in their home, while prominent figures in the magical community might get a portrait mounted on the wall of prestigious institutions such as Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries and the British Ministry of Magic to commemorate them for some public service or accomplishment.
==Portrait person==
Sir Cadogan's portrait was forever challenging people to a fight, falling off its horse and behaving in a fairly unbalanced way, which was how the subject appeared to the poor wizard who had to paint him, while the portrait of the Fat Lady continued to indulge her love of good food, drink, and tip-top security long after her living model passed away.A portrait knew little if anything of its subject's life, and therefore could not hold a very interesting conversation about its subject, as they were only representations of the living subjects as seen by the artist. The exception to this was of the portraits of Hogwarts Headmasters, which were kept in a cupboard from the time of their painting, which was usually very old, until the subject died. The Headmaster could therefore teach their portrait to act and speak like them so that they could teach their successors. Despite this, the people in the portraits were considered a sort of memoir; a support mechanism that could cousel and inform - to an extent - the decisions of the current headteacher. Prior to taking up the post of Headmistress of Hogwarts on a permanent basis, Minerva McGonagall was advised to not mistake those in the paintings for actual people. The depth of knowledge and insight contained in some of the Headmasters' and Headmistresses' portraits was unknown to any but the incumbents of the office and the few students who had realised, over the centuries, that the portraits' apparent sleepiness when visitors arrived in the office was not necessarily genuine.The person depicted in a portrait could therefore live indefinitely,As Phineas Nigellus lived for at least seventy-three years after his portrait was painted, seemingly without ageing or dying. although a portrait did have reason to fear for their life or well-being.
==Magical photographs==
A witch or wizard might also produce a magical photograph that had been put through a special potion. While some of these might simply be animated images occurring in a continuous loop, some reacted to their surroundings. Gilderoy Lockhart had "countless framed photographs" of himself in his office. When Harry, Ron, and Hermione were taken to his office to be interviewed by Dumbledore, McGonagall, and Snape in the Chamber of Secrets, pictures of Lockhart (with his hair now in rollers) dodged out of sight. A few moments later, the photographs were nodding in agreement as Lockhart spoke.
==Known portraits==
Portrait 	Known locations 	Notes
Albus Dumbledore 	Headmaster's office 	During Severus Snape's time as Headmaster the painting hid the Sword of Gryffindor, to keep it safe from Lord Voldemort. He later provided advice to Harry Potter.
Albus Dumbledore 	British Ministry of Magic Headquarters 	During Severus Snape's time as Headmaster the painting hid the Sword of Gryffindor, to keep it safe from Lord Voldemort. He later provided advice to Harry Potter.
Ambrose Swott 	Headmaster's office 	
Anne Boleyn 	
Grand Staircase near the 2nd floor landing	
Bloody Baron 	Near the Potions Classroom 	Slytherin House Ghost
Brutus Scrimgeour 	Hogwarts Trophy Room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Trophy Room and the 4th floor.
Circe 	Grand Staircase 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Circe 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Edgar Stroulger 	Sixth floor of Hogwarts Castle 	Guards a secret passage in 1993
Fat Friar 	One of the Hogwarts Castle's corridors 	Hufflepuff House Ghost
Fat Lady 	Guards the Gryffindor Tower 	Only during the 1992–1993 school year.
Gilderoy Lockhart 	DADA office and classroom. 	Only during the 1992–1993 school year.
Glanmore Peakes 	6th floor landing of the Grand Staircase	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Glanmore Peakes 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Godric Gryffindor 	7th floor landing of the Grand Staircase	Guarded a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room. One of the founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Godric Gryffindor 	Entrance Hall side room 	Guarded a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room. One of the founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Greta Catchlove 	Grand Staircase 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Greta Catchlove 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Harry Potter Sketch 	Probably now in the rubbish bin 	Drawn by Draco Malfoy and given to Harry to unnerve him about the upcoming Quidditch match. - Chapter 14 (Substitute Teacher)
Merwyn the Malicious 	3rd floor landing of the Grand Staircase	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Merwyn the Malicious 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Mirabella Plunkett 	1st floor landing of the Grand Staircase	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Mirabella Plunkett 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Newton Scamander 	Headmaster's office 	
Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington	Hogwarts Castle 	
Norvel Twonk 	5th floor landing of the Grand Staircase	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Norvel Twonk 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Oraclitus Spheer 	Gryffindor Reading Room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Grand Staircase and the Entrance Hall side room.
Rowena Ravenclaw 	Hogwarts Castle 	Rowan Khanna took the portrait to History of Magic classes on several occasions between 1988 and 1990. - History of Magic classes One of the founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Salazar Slytherin 	Dungeons antechamber 	Concealed a secret passage between the Dungeons antechamber and the Entrance Hall side room. One of the founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Salazar Slytherin 	Entrance Hall side room 	Concealed a secret passage between the Dungeons antechamber and the Entrance Hall side room. One of the founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Valeria Myriadd 	1991–1992 school year
*Main halls of Hogwarts Castle
*Grand Staircase
*Gryffindor Tower
1992–1993 school year
*Main halls of Hogwarts Castle
*Grand Staircase
*In the Library	Secret passage between the Gryffindor Tower to a Disused seventh floor bathroom
Violet 	A small chamber off of the Great Hall 	Is friends with the Fat Lady.
Vulpus 	Headmaster's office 	
Woman in the hospital wing 	Hospital Wing, Hogwarts Castle 	
==Behind the scenes==
*In the games, portraits are shown to be far more interactive than in any other media, with objects able to move from the portrait out to the real world and vice versa. Many puzzles in both games revolve around getting a portrait to give you a necessary object, or bringing a real world object into the portrait to assist its occupants.
*J. K. Rowling once claimed in an interview that all of the portraits seen at Hogwarts depict deceased individuals.Edinburgh Book Festival, Sunday 15th August 2004 This is not strictly true, however; Gilderoy Lockhart owned several portraits of himself which he hung in his classroom and office.
*In a scene in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, a portrait features someone that resembles Lord Voldemort. This may be a coincidence, or the director's idea.
**In the same film, Draco Malfoy enchants his sketch of a stupid-looking Harry Potter flying on a broomstick, crashing into things, to make Harry uneasy about the Quidditch Tournament.
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==Notes and references==
Category:Foundables
Category:Portraits