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Ever since there have been paintings and they have been framed, it is somewhat surprising that no serious research has ever been undertaken on the problem of the frame. To be sure, some scholars have published studies on the different types of frames employed, particularly in Europe during the last centuries; they have classified them according to certain criteria and traced out their variations through various epochs and countries. But the principal question has been avoided: why the frame? Perhaps because it is not capable of being answered; perhaps because located at the limits of esthetics, at the border between painting and furniture, it is considered to have lesser importance in comparison with theories of the visual arts, which have particularly drawn the attention of historians and art critics, not to mention essays full of good will by amateurs in the mood for writing.
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- Copyright © 1962 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)
References
1 J. v. Falke, Rahmen, 1892; M. Guggenheim, Le cornici italiane dalla metà del secolo XV allo scorcio del XVI, Milan, 1897; E. Bock, Florentinische und venetianische Bilderrahmen aus der Zeit der Gotik und Renaissance, Munich, 1902; Cadres et bordures de tableaux de la fin du XVIe siècle au premier empire, Paris, 1910; Serge Roche, Cadres français et étrangers du XVe au XVIIIe siècle, Paris, s.a.; Catalogue de l'exposition du cadre ancien du XVIe au XIXe siècle, Paris, Galerie Louis Sambon, 1924; Werner Ehlich, Bild und Rahmen im Alter tum, Leipzig, 1954.
2 Peinture et réalité, Paris, 1958.
3 Sermo pauperis Henrici de Sancto Nemine cum preservatione eiusdem ab epidemia, Augsburg, 1510 (Information provided by Prof. E. Castelli).
4 Vingt leçons sur les beaux-arts, Paris, 1931.
5 Roger Caillois, "Où commence l'art?", Arts, Paris, September 2, 1960.
6 Max J. Friedlander, On Art and Connoisseurship, Oxford, 1942.
7 Kurt Koffka, Principles of Gestalt Psychology, New York, 1935.
8 Frank Lloyd Wright, May 16, 1956 in The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1960.
9 Germain Bazin, "Réaménagement du Musée du Jeu de Paume", Museum, Vol. 14-1, 1961, Paris.
10 Robert Volmat, L'Art Psychopathologique, Paris, 1955.
11 Information furnished by Mr. Charles Sterling.
12 Cf. the Gentil Bernard of the Musée Royal des Beaux-Arts of Brussells or Tibériade. The analytical catalogue of Rouault's works drawn up by Pierre Cour thion and Isabelle Rouault, limits the term "frame painted by the artists" to the frame painted on the canvas, not specifying cases in which the artist has painted on the wooden removable frame.
13 From Remote Field (1944) to Estampage (1961). Nevertheless, the painter confided to Michel Conil Lacoste, who reports the interview in Le Monde, 24 Oc tober 1961: "The frame strangles a painting. In fact, a work is hung twice, first by its frame, and secondly to its nail." Perhaps by frame the artist means only that element of different nature imposed onto the painting.
14 Gaston Wiet connects this fact of overflowing the frame to literary me mories : "Just as in descriptions in the Book of Kings the gilded points of golden banners rise up to the skies, penetrating the margins of the page as if they were piercing the clouds." (Livre des Rois, II, pp. 361, 467, 468, 482). Firdusi descri bes the flag eight cubits high "similar to a tree on the crest of a mountain which seems to be touching the moon." (I, p. 443, III, pp. 153, 192). Placing the head of a banner "above the sky" has become a cliché (Sa'di, Gulistan, p. 148), in "Miniatures persanes turques et indiennes", Mémoires de l'Institut d'Egypte, Vol. XLVII, Cairo, 1943.
15 Honorius Augustodunensis, Expositio in Cantico Canticorum (Cod. XI. 80), Saint-Florian, 1301.
16 The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1960.
17 Der Bildrahmen als ästhetischer Ausdruck von Schutzfunctionen, Halle, 1909.
18 "Chinese Pictorial Art", Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente. Serie orientale, Vol. XIX, Rome, 1958.
19 Cf. note 4.
20 From the Italian cornice, frame.
21 April 28, 1639.
22 Letter of Mile Isabelle Rivière to the author.
23 Indian Painting under the Moghols, Oxford, 1909.
24 Réflexions critiques sur la poésie et la peinture, Paris, 1719.
25 Cf. note 18.
26 S. Seulô and de Saint Victor, Nouveau manuel complet des fabricants de cadres, Paris, 1896.
27 "Le musée du Jeu de Paume," Museum, Vol. I, Paris, 1947.
28 Banija, Moscow, 1930.
29 The Art Spirit, New York, 1923.
30 In this short study, only a particular case could be encompassed: the frame of a painting. A similar work on photographic frames, while keeping to the same general line, would make it possible to emphasize other elements, among others, the preliminary importance of "cropping," less apparent, but also very important in painting; the multiple choices, as much in the shooting of the ne gative as in the development of the proof, quickly offer a wide field in the render ing, and might, at first glance, seem to diminish the role of the border. Also, one must not forget that photography was born in an epoch of the decadence of the frame, abandoned to the framer; a further reason, therefore, for the predominance of the content. More detailed research might be brought to bear on mirror-frames. In that case, the image framed is only a transitory reflection of reality, without any direct human intervention. (Of course, it must be understood that distorting glass is not being discussed here.) An interpretation of the world appears, which, despite differences in its realization, takes on the appearance of a picture. In fact, man frames the mirror, a simple plane surface with particular properties and limited dimensions; thereby delimiting an image over which he has no power. The object, frame-mirror, is inert and simply permits the presentation of a moving scene which by chance is enclosed within a certain outline. The fixed frame no longer surrounds a congealed representation with which it may become identified and form a unit; there is a sharp separation between that which contains and that which is contained. Greater still is the difference in the case of the cinema and television frame, fixed in advance and in which moving images are presented; "cropping" normally takes on a still greater importance. The frame of a bas relief does not necessarily seem to pose new problems; it is very closely related to the picture frame, even if the third dimension no longer appears only in the border. Finally, taking on its value with relationship to the period, and to the space enclosing the scene and limiting it, there is the frame of our theatre which stage managers are attemptings to avoid in a effort to renew ancient traditions. However, wishing to generalize from a particular example, main lines end up by becoming blurred; painting remains a special case, although there may be nu merous windows, holes in the wall or bays opening widely on a familiar or unusual world.
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