What a difference a frame makes

1/27/2017

One of the things that, as a relatively new artist, is a certain amount of trepidation about framing your work. Framing can be eye-wateringly expensive. Especially for large canvases. If your lucky you can manage it for £100 or so.

However if you paint on board, or paper then your options are significantly expanded and you get a decent frame for under £30. Some of the basic ones can come in under £15. I get mine from Eze Frame which provides a wide range and of frames with a very well designed feature that allows you to customize your frames. Other similar websites are available but I find this the easiest to use.

Examples of effect of cheap frames can be seen with some of my Left-Over paintings.

The frame on the left activates the painting nicely whereas the one on the right gives it more substance and dignity. I think so anyway. It appears to be a proper painting. You could see someone buying that. One day, here's hoping.

Because I'm an idiot i bought frames that were the wrong size for their intended recipients however they made for very good frames for more left over paintings.

These are painted on oil paper. The frames come with an MDF backing board and a free perspex cover. You can upgrade this to glass if you choose. Backing them with the board and fronting them with the perspex gives a rigidity the piece. The colours of the frame also compliment the colours in the painting. Again it gives a solidity to the pieces. I like looking them in their frames. Makes me feel like a proper artist.

My wife like gold. The small frames are cheap and so I have framed a number of my mini-mix paintings. Of course this produces the additional benefit of allowing you to put the paintings on the wall.

Look nice don't they? I particularly like the moths.

All of this is building somewhere, trust me. I have been wanting to better display some of my maxi-mix paintings so I can put them up around my house. If they work, I might role this out to some kind of exhibition. You can judge the effect from the pictures below.

The frames provide a nice context to the pictures, they augment them. You have to be little bit careful that the colour of the frame compliments the picture but it is just a case of picking out the main colour (or colours) and chosing something that goes with that.

I also dabble in goache patterns and the occasional watercolour still life. My wife is often telling me that the former are quite commercial and I should frame them and look to sell them. So I bought a few simple black frames to see how they look. They look good but it makes me think about composition in that the pictures work better if they don't encroach to near to the edge of the page.