A Zero for Presentation

"View of the Grand Salon Carr in the Louvre." 1861.
by Giuseppe Castiglione. Not the best way to view art,
but pieces were given respect.

Copyright © Edward Riojas

I don’t often get out, but when I do and a fine dining establishment is on the itinerary, then I have expectations.  Among those expectations is a respectable presentation of food. The entree should be nicely arranged on a real plate and not hanging off the edge of a styrofoam circle.

We expect the same in personal appearance. Most everyone has basic standards when it comes to personal hygiene, and women ramp up those standards to nose-bleed heights. A member of the fairer sex doesn’t just throw on makeup – the process is time-honored and time-consuming. Neither is a beautiful face left to be framed by hat head or pillow head or a rat’s nest.

The same goes for a piece of art – or at least it should. High standards for presentation were once observed in the grand art salons of Europe, but apparently that excellence is now considered gauche in modern galleries. Art frames used to be furniture for the wall, echoing the style of the day, be it Gothic or Baroque or Rococo. Based on current trends, it is clear we have opted for the absence of style.

The fashion among cutting-edge artists is to shun frames and, apparently, all common sense. This becomes more obvious with each art show I attend. Paintings historically had enormous frames. They eventually adopted less ornate ones, then simple strips of “lath” were considered sufficient. Now a canvas might sport painted edges – if it sports anything at all.

Likewise drawings, which used to be sealed behind glass and mattes and frames, are now crucified to gallery walls by push pins and thumb tacks. The job once tackled by framing masters can now be done by the gallery handyman.

“Hey George, waddya think will work on dat big sketch – some sinkers or penny nails?”

“Nah. There’s some duct tape in my box.”

It’s like artist’s brains have seized up. They want to create such absurdly-large works that they ignore how best to present them. Sadly, presentation is often on the far edge of an artist’s radar screen. Sometimes there isn’t even a blip.

What is sadder than an artist’s lack of presentation skills is their ignorance of conservation.

Frames serve a real purpose. They are protection for the artwork contained therein. A canvas’s stretcher frame is given greater rigidity with the addition of an outer frame, and that rigidity is amplified by increasingly-massive frame designs. It’s hard to ignore the fragility of a canvas while toting it around in a frame weighing as much as a sofa.

For drawings, the addition of mattes and glass increases the protection. Not only are the artwork’s edges fully protected, but it becomes nearly impossible to touch the drawing that is susceptible to many things, including corrosive oils contained in a human’s nasty paws.

Another function of frames is to delineate the boundaries of the art, respective of the environment in which it hangs. Like the china in a fine restaurant, a frame keeps the artwork where it belongs and visually separates it from everything else that is not part of the artwork.

“You may come this far, but no farther...” Thus spoke The Creator, recorded in the book of Job, when commanding primordial elements into existence. In essence, that is similar to the purpose of a frame – to delineate the boundaries of an art piece and allow the viewer’s eye to give art the respect it deserves. Then again, perhaps the creators of these pieces don’t expect much respect. If that is the case, we may certainly oblige.

"Elephants." 2012. by Adonna Khare. The edge of a drawing should not appear this way in public – much less in a gallery.