Artist's Frame

About Artist's Frame

Most frames are chosen after a picture is finished. An artist's frame is different: the painter designed, made or painted it as part of the work. Jan van Eyck already treated the frame as integral, painting inscriptions on the original frame of his Man in a Red Turban (1433).

The idea returned strongly in the 19th century. Dante Gabriel Rossetti drew flat gilt frames with roundels; James McNeill Whistler had frames reeded and painted to continue the colour harmony of his canvases; Georges Seurat carried his dots onto painted borders and frames so that colour would not stop abruptly at the edge. In Vienna, Gustav Klimt worked with his brother Georg on frames for his paintings. Later, Howard Hodgkin painted across the frame as though it were part of the picture. Look for frames that pick up the colour, pattern or logic of the image inside.