Ian Geraghty

The Reconfigured Frame

Various Forms and Functions of the Physical Frame in Contemporary .

A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. College of Fine , University of New South Wales, Sydney.

October 2008 Abstract.

This thesis is a critical analysis and reconfiguration of the physical frame in contemporary art. Drawing on historical, theoretical and technical knowledge bases, the thesis characterises the physical frame as the material manifestation of an act (or set of acts) of : a constructed ‘surplus’ or necessary appendage created to mediate and protect an artwork, connecting it to physical and conceptual contexts in order to facilitate a better understanding of the framed work. The frame is thus depicted as ‘work-sensitive’, being formed in response to, and as a direct result of, the work of art. This distinguishes the frame from notions of ‘site’ and ‘place’, which both connote pre- existing spaces. The physical frame, rather than describing the setting or site to which an artwork is added or contributes to, describes the material build-up which is added to the work.

The thesis documents and examines the various ways that contemporary artists employ physical frames to negotiate physical and conceptual space for artworks. This framing perspective is contrary to the prevalent mindset that contemporary artworks - having broken out beyond the picture frame into real space and time - are now frameless. As a result of this research, the physical frame is reconfigured as an open-ended cellular construct, offering up multiple narrative threads.

A distinction is made in the thesis between an ‘immediate’ frame (a frame immediately attached to an artwork which the viewer stands on the ‘outside’ of, such as a picture frame) and an ‘extended’ frame (an immersive kind of frame experienced by the viewer from ‘within’ the frame, as with a ‘circumtextual’ frame). In addition to clarifying and developing upon existing framing terminology, this thesis presents a new taxonomic scale of frames in order to test the hypothesis that ‘immediate’ frames can be discussed and categorised according to their level of involvement with their associated artworks. This framing model offers a new filter through which to approach the contemporary artwork, and provides a method, vocabulary and set of questions to dissect and articulate the presence and relevance of a detected frame.

Table of Contents.

Foreword. iv

Definitions of Framing Terms. vii

Introduction. 1 . Aims of Research. 1 . The Frame and its Relevance. 6 . A New Model for Looking at the Physical Frame at the Point of Presentation. 8 . Chapter Outline. 13

Chapter 1: A Recent History of the Physical Frame and its Functions. 16 . Functions of the Independent Picture Frame. 16 . The Absorption of the Frame into the Artwork. 38 . The Politics of Framing from the Late Nineteenth Century to the Present. 40 . Breaking Out of the Independent Frame. 52 . From Isolated Artwork to Discursive Context. 63 . Extending the Notion of an ‘Immediate’ Frame. 64 . Mounting. 64 . Pinning. 66 . Propping (propping supports and shelves). 66 . The ‘Implied’ Frame. 67 . The Evolution and Function of the Gallery. 67 . The Wall as Passe-Partout / The Gallery as Frame. 77 . How the Gallery and Independent Frame Function Together. 82

Chapter 2: Frame or ‘Frame’? Framing or ‘Framing’? Framed or Frameless? 83 . Existing Methods of Frame Description and Identification. 83 . Cadre/Cornice/Frame. 88 . The Plethora of Frame Categories. 89 . The Frame as ‘Text’. 90 i . Frame or ‘Frame’? Framing or ‘Framing’? 90 . Defining the Frame. 92 . The Act of Framing by the Artist or Frame-Maker (‘Prior’ Framing). 93 . Interpretation as an Act of ‘Framing’ (‘Post’ Framing). 93 . ‘Extratextual’, ‘Intratextual’, ‘Intertextual’ and ‘Circumtextual’ Framing. 94 . Invisibility – ‘THIS FRAME WILL SELF-DESTRUCT MOMENTARILY AFTER ENGAGEMENT BY THE VIEWER WITH THE ARTWORK’. 97 . Acknowledging Context, Site and the Frame (Similarities and Differences). 103 . The Artist as Boundary-Maker, and the Perpetual Framing Process. 112 . Art and Life (a Blurring of Boundaries). 116 . Installation Art, the ‘Circumtextual’ Frame, and the Fallacy of the Frameless Artwork. 122

Chapter 3: Contemporary Incarnations of the ‘Immediate’ Physical Frame. 134 . Darbyshire Framemakers. 134 . Jacky Redgate / . 140 . , Stool (1990) / Yuji Takeoka, Floating Pedestal (1992). 149 . . 155 . . 159 . Counter Editions. 168 . Jack Pierson. 171 . Hany Armanious / John Spiteri / Matthys Gerber. 173 . Vitrines ( / Kate Rohde / / Sean Cordeiro and Claire Healy). 183 . Plinths (Jim Lambie / Steven Gontarski / Lionel Bawden / Gareth Jones). 193 . Shaun Gladwell / Hilary Lloyd. 216

Chapter 4: Exploring the ‘Extended’ Physical Frame. 225 . Frames Within Installations and in Series. 225 . Artist-Controlled Experiments With the ‘Extended’ Frame. 243

ii Conclusion. 263 . The Need to Continually Reassess the Frame. 263 . The Reconfigured Frame. 263 . The Frame as Contested Space. 265 . The Necessity of the Frame. 266 . The Frame as a Connecting Device. 266 . ‘Site’ is Not the New Frame. 267 . Exhibition Design. 267 . The ‘Curatorial’ Frame. 269 . A Precursor to the White-Walled Gallery Setting. 270 . How the New Framing Model and Categories Function. 270

Bibliography. 273

List of Images. 291

Acknowledgements. 301

iii Foreword.

I would like to start by contextualising this research within my broader art practice and personal history because to some extent I feel as if I have almost stumbled across the subject of the frame.

As a Fine Art student in the early nineties, the frame and concept of framing was regarded as an outdated idea and was either avoided completely or was approached with caution usually under the guise of a more contemporary heading such as ‘presentation’, ‘display’, ‘context’, ‘staging’, or ‘mediation’. It was almost as if any concession to (or utterance of) a frame would be seen as a step into the past, or seen as some kind of submission to commodity culture. This aversion to the frame and framing flourished, quite paradoxically, in an era of Contextual Studies and exhaustive discussions surrounding ‘site-specificity’ and ‘placement’, where the emphasis - as with the frame - was very much on the artwork’s margin or periphery. Despite some obvious comparative links between context, site and the supposedly deceased or defunct physical frame, the issue of the contemporary frame was skirted around, neglected, in an attempt to avoid the frame’s accrued connotations - particularly those of containment and bourgeois connoisseurship.

It wasn’t until I was offered a part-time job as a Framing Technician with a London gallery which specialised in modern British paintings that the ‘f’ word entered my psyche and started to feature consistently in my conversations about art. This position ran concurrent with both my undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, so it was perhaps inevitable that I would start to make comparisons between how I was framing space and defining boundaries in my own art practice (which at the time incorporated , installation and architecture) with how I was framing pictorial space at the gallery. A dialogue began to emerge between how traditional paintings negotiated physical and conceptual space (courtesy of their gilded frames) and how contemporary artworks, installations and exhibitions negotiated their space and place in the world. It became clear that these two seemingly disparate realms of art could be united through a shared consideration for what could in essence be described as: framing. This acknowledgment that the basic tenets of framing still applied to contemporary art, opened up for me the

iv possibility of a reconfigured physical frame - related to, but perhaps distinct from, my understanding of context and site. The physical frame thus being the material manifestation of an act (or series of acts) of framing. Up until this point, I had not regarded physical frames as particularly relevant to contemporary art, despite the fact that the conventional material frame had never really disappeared at all (as a trip to any contemporary art museum or gallery stockroom could confirm).

This interest in framing continued when I moved to Sydney in 1999 and started a gallery called Grey Matter Contemporary Art in my apartment above a Chinese restaurant in Glebe. Grey Matter extended my ongoing investigation into, firstly, what happens to individual artworks when they are incorporated into an exhibition and composed into a unitary experience, secondly, the boundaries of authorship between artist and curator, and thirdly, notions of the curator/exhibition-maker as a kind of frame-maker. The intention was to develop an exaggerated and self-reflexive curatorial style which approached exhibition-making as a form of experimental research rather than as an end-product of research. This included exploratory exhibition design, the inclusion of curatorial red-herrings, and unconventional zoning methods. As a result, the emphasis was shifted from artwork to frame.

Running concurrent with Grey Matter, I was also working as Head Framer for a framing studio in Sydney and was continuing to critically analyse the physical frame in contemporary art and how it functions in relation to its associated artwork(s). I was also occasionally exhibiting my own work as an artist in galleries and exhibitions where I had little or no control over seemingly trivial extra-artistic matters such as gallery wall labels and room sheets (‘list of works’ and gallery texts), and had become acutely aware that there were very subtle things that could happen in an exhibition which could prevent an artwork from doing its job. On one occasion, the dates for sixty line drawings - which I had completed over a five year period - had been left off of the gallery labels and room sheet. For me, a time-line or temporal aesthetic was lost due to bad framing.

This expanded notion of what constitutes an act of framing is mirrored in this thesis by an equally expansive notion of what qualifies as a frame: I am clearly not just focusing on the four bits of wood which circumnavigate the edge of some artworks, but have in mind a reconfigured notion of what a frame is (or can be) today. As if displaced by v centrifugal force, my attention has been pulled away from the centre and is now directed firmly towards the edge, revealing an activity which at times goes far beyond the placement of a solid and static rectangle or box around an isolated artwork or collection of things.

vi Definitions of Framing Terms.

The following definitions are for key framing terms referred to in this thesis. Some of the terms are my own and are being introduced here for the first time, whilst others are already in wide circulation. Although the emphasis of this thesis is on the physical frame, not all of the categories below refer to purely material frames; nonetheless, they have clear relevance to this area of research. Because there is a degree of overlap between some of the listed terms, they should not necessarily be read as mutually exclusive categories. This list should also not be regarded as an extensive inventory of frame types being introduced or discussed in this thesis but, rather, as a way of increasing the readability of the main text, and as a springboard into the discourse of the physical frame.

An Immediate Frame: An ‘immediate’ frame refers to a frame that is immediately attached to (or forms a part of) an artwork, which we ordinarily stand on the ‘outside’ of looking into or at, and which could potentially be transported with the artwork from setting to setting. The ‘immediate’ frame is a broad term which covers traditional physical frames such as independent picture frames, vitrines, plinths and display cases, as well as more contemporary incarnations of the physical frame such as lightboxes and dry-mounting substrates/sub-frames etc. Whether from its inner or outer edge - or in a related fashion (as with a plinth) - an ‘immediate’ frame attempts to define what might (initially) be described as a boundary or ‘containment line’ for an artwork.

An Extended Frame: An ‘extended’ frame refers to a frame which could be described as ‘immersive’, or a frame which can be experienced by the viewer from ‘within’ the frame. In other words, frames which we pass through in order to experience a work. Again, this is a broad term which covers a number of identifiable frames such as: the ‘circumtextual’ frame; the ‘institutional’ frame; and the ‘exhibition/curatorial’ frame (see all below).

vii An Artist’s Frame: An ‘artist’s’ frame is a frame that has been conceived, designed and/or fabricated by an artist specifically for one (or more) of his or her own artworks. This term is often used in connection with independent picture frames produced by artists during the mid to late nineteenth century (such as Ford Madox Brown, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Edgar Degas, and Georges Seurat) when artists started to take a more wide-spread interest in how their paintings were to be presented, but examples of ‘artist’s’ frames also precede and continue on from this influential and relatively well documented period.1

A Post-Production Frame: A ‘post-production’ frame is a frame that has been added to an artwork after the artist in question has relinquished control of its production. This includes frames that have been applied to artworks by collectors, or frames that are the result of re-framing without input from the artist. A ‘post-production’ frame is therefore beyond the authorial control of the artist and can be seen as the binary opposite of the ‘artist’s’ frame.

A Collaborative Frame: A ‘collaborative’ frame sits somewhere between an ‘artist’s’ frame and a ‘post- production’ frame and involves a degree of authorial collaboration between two or more artistic/aesthetic visions. Although a ‘collaborative’ frame can be initiated by an individual artist, the collaborator/frame-maker will have relatively more freedom and creative input than would be the case with an ‘artist’s’ frame. With a ‘collaborative’ frame, the frame-maker/collaborator is usually prominently credited for his or her part in the frame’s production. An example of this would be the walk-in environment for The Upper Room (1999-2002) which was designed by architect David Adjaye specifically to 13 paintings by .2

1 For a more in-depth explanation of the ‘artist’s’ frame and for examples see Chapter 9 in Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts, Frameworks (London: Merrell Holberton, 1996), pp. 352-419; and Chapter 6 in W. H. Bailey, Defining Edges: A New Look at Picture Frames (New York: Abrams, 2002), pp. 90-111. 2 The term ‘collaborative’ frame tends not to apply to ‘immediate’ frames because although there is inevitably a degree of collaboration between an artist and a framer when an artist gets something professionally framed, authorial control (invariably, from my experience) stays with the artist. The role of the frame-maker is to offer professional advice and then to respond to the artist’s demands. In such circumstances, the frame is still considered an artist-controlled frame or ‘artist’s’ frame. For example, it is widely known within the framing industry that Mark Darbyshire (frame-maker) has worked closely with artist Damien Hirst on various occasions (fabricating a number of Hirst’s medicine cabinets and heart-shaped frames for instance), however, the frames produced are not credited to Darbyshire at the artwork’s point of exhibition. viii An Intracompositional Frame: An ‘intracompositional’ frame is outlined by John H. Pearson in his essay ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’ (1990) as a frame (in both literature and painting) that is considered to be an element of the artistic composition. For example, Pearson presents Cervantes’ Preface to his sequel of Don Quixote as ‘intracompositional’ because the “Preface and novel collaborate rather than remain utterly distinct”.3 In relation to visual art, the notion of an ‘intracompositional’ frame deals directly with the question of whether a frame is considered part of an artwork or not: if it is, then the frame is ‘intracompositional’; if it is not, then the frame is ‘extracompositional’. ‘Intracompositional’ frames, as Pearson states, “bespeak a desire to integrate artist, art work and spectator/reader; they seek to bring creation, product and consumption within one frame that would not exclude or deny any part of the esthetic process”.4 In other words, Pearson identifies in late nineteenth-century artists a desire to extend the boundary of their artistic practices to incorporate the post-production realms of presentation and reception as a way of maintaining control of their work beyond the process of creation and into the process of consumption. This push by artists to harness the latter stages of what Michael Carter refers to as the “aesthetic circuit”5 was fuelled by a growing awareness and resentment amongst artists relating to how their artworks were being mediated and appropriated once their work had left the studio. For this reason, the ‘intracompositional’ frame is never entirely free of political connotation.

A Parergonal Frame: In The Critique of Judgement, Immanuel Kant characterises the frame as a ‘parergon’ (‘par’ = by, ‘ergon’ = work), something external and non-essential to the artwork.6 The term refers to frames which are considered ‘extracompositional’ (ie., not part of the actual artwork). It is often used in connection with picture frames which have

3 John H. Pearson, ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’ in Mosaic (23/1, 1990), p. 15. 4 Ibid., p. 16. 5 See Michael Carter, Framing Art: Introducing Theory and the Visual Image (Sydney: Hale & Iremonger, 1990), pp. 33-36. Carter’s diagram for the ‘aesthetic circuit’ consists of three boxes: Box I = The artist; Box II = The art object; and Box III = The viewer. 6 See Immanuel Kant (translated by James Creed Meredith), The Critique of Judgement (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952): “Even what is called ornamentation (parerga), i.e. what is only an adjunct, and not an intrinsic constituent in the complete representation of the object, in augmenting the delight of taste does so only by means of its form. Thus it is with the frames of pictures or the drapery on statues, or the colonnades of palaces. But if the ornamentation does not itself enter into the composition of the beautiful form - if it is introduced like a gold frame merely to win approval for the picture by means of its charm - it is then called finery and takes away from the genuine beauty.”, p. 68. ix decorative or ornamental features, particularly when these frames have been crafted by a frame-maker without a particular picture in mind; but it is also used more generally to describe frames which act as definitive markers between what is ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ of the work. This rather static notion of the frame has since been deconstructed by Jacques Derrida in his essay ‘Parergon’ where he creates ambiguity over what constitutes ‘parerga’.7

The Institutional Frame: This is a broad term which is commonly used to describe, as Robert Smithson put it, “the apparatus the artist is threaded through”.8 By ‘institution’, Smithson and other artists such as Daniel Buren, Michael Asher and Hans Haacke, were referring to the museum/gallery system(s), funding bodies, critical discourses and educational institutions which shape cultural output, its meaning and its value. The ‘institutional’ frame became symbolic with the neo-avant-garde, particularly in the 1970s, as the thing which most needed to be critiqued and transgressed in order for art to have greater relevance outside of (the institution of) art itself.

The First and Second Frame: In his 1977 essay ‘Comments on the Second Frame’ Joseph Kosuth divides the ‘institutional’ frame into two frames.9 The ‘first’ frame being the institution of painting and sculpture, which Kosuth claims was broken during the late sixties with the arrival of . The ‘second’ frame refers to the institutional mechanisms and processes active in defining art, its meaning and cultural worth. Kosuth claims that the breaking of the ‘second’ frame “begins for artists with their taking responsibility for the kinds of meaning which accrue to their work”, with the removal of the “layer of

7 See ‘Parergon’ in Jacques Derrida (translated by Geoff Bennington & Ian McLeod), The Truth in Painting (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), pp. 15-147; for example, “A parergon comes against, beside, and in addition to the ergon, the work done [fait], the fact [le fait], the work, but it does not fall to one side, it touches and cooperates within the operation, from a certain outside. Neither simply outside nor simply inside.”, p. 54; “This delimitation of the centre and the integrity of the representation, of its inside and its outside, might already seem strange...Where does a Parergon begin and end.”, p. 57; “Where does the frame take place. Does it take place. Where does it begin. Where does it end. What is its internal limit. Its external limit.”, p. 63. 8 See Robert Smithson (edited by Bruce Kurz), ‘Conversation with Robert Smithson on April 22nd 1972’ in Nancy Holt (ed), The Writings of Robert Smithson (New York: New York University Press, 1979), p. 200. 9 Joseph Kosuth, ‘Comments on the Second Frame’ (1977) in Gabriele Guercio (ed), Joseph Kosuth, Art After Philosophy and After: Collected Writings, 1966-90 (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1991), pp. 169-173. Joseph Kosuth’s ‘Comments on the Second Frame’ was first published in Christine Bernhardt (ed), Was Erwartest Du? (Cologne: Galerie Paul Maenz, 1977). x mystification” created by ‘institutional’ framing, and with the initiation of “cultural activity … which makes opaque the transparent institutional frame”.10 In doing so, the artist is positioned closer to the audience/community, leading to an art activity which is less mediated by existing codes and conventions, and more socially integrated.

A Circumtextual Frame: Gale MacLachlan and Ian Reid define a ‘circumtextual’ frame as the surrounding features, material presentation/packaging and “location in space” of a particular text/artwork. They give the example of how “the presence of references, a bibliography and an index” in a book, “as well as the kind of bookshop where it is sold, all contribute to the way readers interpret the information it contains”. These framing cues, MacLachlan and Reid continue, “help to establish the scholarly affiliations of the book, distinguishing it from, say, popular fiction”.11

An Exhibition/Curatorial Frame: An ‘exhibition/curatorial’ frame refers to the physical staging and conceptual ideas which go together to make up an exhibition and create the context within which the artwork(s) in question are presented. Although not exclusively physical, an ‘exhibition/curatorial’ frame includes exhibition design and the specific environment created by other works included in the exhibition.

10 Ibid., p. 172. See also John C. Welchman, ‘In and Around the “Second Frame”’ in Paul Duro (ed), The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 203-222. 11 Gale MacLachlan and Ian Reid, Framing and Interpretation (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1994), p. 4. xi Introduction.

Aims of Research. The physical frame in contemporary art is an elastic and amorphous thing with the ability to appear and disappear almost at the blink of an eye. It can be an integral part of an artwork, being as interwoven and visually inseparable as the bodywork is of a car, or it can announce an artwork to an audience and then recede back and pretend that it is invisible. The contemporary frame can be a refrigeration unit,1 and it can be elephant dung.2 It can be a cheap readymade frame bought at a department store, or it can be a hand-finished gesso frame developed in close collaboration with a professional frame- maker. In addition, the frame can be perceived as a collectively generated transitional zone through which we (the audience) must pass in order to get to an artwork.3 In fact the contemporary physical frame has become so multiform and mobile in function that it is often difficult to detect, and at times, barely recognisable as a frame at all.

The primary aim of this research is to identify and locate the physical frame in contemporary art and to develop a coherent theoretical model and language through which the contemporary physical frame and its functions can be discussed and (re)evaluated. This begins with the basic distinction between an ‘immediate’ frame (a frame which we stand on the outside of) and an ‘extended’ frame (a frame which is immersive). As well as clarifying and developing upon existing framing terminology, this thesis presents a new scale of frames based upon how the ‘immediate’ frame relates to (or forms a part of) its associated artwork(s). Through the application of this taxonomic scale, the frame’s relevance to an artwork can now be articulated with more precision than was previously the case.

1 As in Marc Quinn’s Self (1991), which is a cast of the artist’s head in frozen blood in a refrigeration display case. 2 As with Chris Ofili’s paintings propped against the wall on elephant dung ‘pedestals’. 3 I am referring here to an immersive and cellular kind of frame made up of ‘circumtextual’ matter such as exhibition posters, gallery wall labels, artist’s catalogues, exhibition invitations/flyers, magazine advertisements etc. These physical components, which can all be regarded as evidence of framing processes, constitute a penetrable (but still physical) ‘extended’ frame around an artwork or set of artworks. 1 The specific focus of this research is on artist-controlled frames at the point of presentation. A key objective is to document the various ways that contemporary artists employ physical frames to negotiate physical and conceptual space for artworks, to draw attention to artworks, to define boundaries for artworks, to facilitate the reading of artworks, and/or to add content to artworks. Individual artist approaches have been collated and analysed to see if any collective language or idiosyncratic framing practices emerge. As part of my methodology, field interviews were carried out with artists who I saw as being significant in this area.4 These interviews were structured around examples of the artists’ work which were seen as most relevant to the concept of framing. The thesis was also informed by discussions with leading contemporary frame- makers, gallerists, curators, and conservators in Sydney, London, and Melbourne. Selected information gathered from these interviews has been integrated throughout the thesis to help create a more detailed overview of the current framing landscape and to help ascertain the level of experimentation and engagement with framing theory amongst artists, arts professionals and industry today.

This reinvigorated analysis of the frame comes at a point in art history when many consider the notion of the frame to be irreparably broken following more than a century of frame critique. This so-called ‘frame-breaking’ started with the deconstruction and rejection of the picture frame, and lead out and beyond the ‘immediate’ frame towards a critique of the ‘institutional’ frame.5 The frame, from such a historical perspective, has been shattered into a thousand pieces by lateral extension; shamed into hiding by the picture plane’s invasion of real space; consumed by modern art’s assertion of materiality; considered a bankrupt gesture following the demise of the hermetic autonomous art object; rebuffed after the dismantling of the artwork as a transportable commodity; and dispensed with once and for all by the proverbial breaking of Joseph

4 The frame examples which I have used illustrate different ideas of what a frame can be and the different ways that a frame can relate to (or form a part of) an artwork. Rather than providing a complete landscape or definitive survey of frames, a study such as this can only ever claim to be partial, non- exhaustive, and personal. 5 For good general accounts of the critique of picture frames see Christine Traber, ‘In Perfect Harmony? Escaping the Frame in the Early 20th Century’ in Eva Mendgen (ed), In Perfect Harmony: Picture and Frame 1850-1920 (Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum, 1995), pp. 221-247; Germano Celant, ‘Framed: Innocence or Gilt?’ in Artforum (Vol. 20, March, 1982), pp. 49-55; and Brian O’Doherty, Inside the (San Francisco: The Lapis Press, 1986), pp. 13-34. For a concise account of the shift to a critique of the ‘institutional’ frame see Craig Owen, ‘From Work to Frame, or is There Life After “The Death of the Author”?’ in Implosion: Ett Postmodernt Perspectiv / A Postmodern Perspective (Stockholm: Moderna Museet, 1987), pp. 207-212; and John C. Welchman, ‘In and Around the “Second Frame”’ in Paul Duro (ed), The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 203-222. 2 Kosuth’s ‘second’ frame. In fact it is not uncommon to hear claims that contemporary artworks are “frameless”, and for such claims to go totally unchallenged.6 This history of questioning the edge, containment, and the validity of boundaries from within art itself has been echoed in related theoretical discourses and literature, most notably by Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction of Immanuel Kant’s ‘parergonal’ frame and the implication of continuous ‘text’ (the breakdown or blurring of distinctions between ‘text’ and context), thus theoretically undermining the frame as an effective device for separating ‘inside’ from ‘out’.

It is with this history in mind that this research focuses on the residual ‘immediate’ frame which has survived this one hundred year assault (with its functions, one might add, remarkably unscathed) as well as on the reincarnated and reconfigured physical frame in its many and varied forms. In doing so, this thesis seeks to break the surprisingly common mindset that the contemporary physical frame is now either redundant or non-existent.

One recent and notable publication dedicated to redressing the tendency to ignore the existence of the frame in the is Paul Duro’s edited anthology The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork:

The task of any discussion of frames and framing in the visual arts is first and foremost to counter the tendency of the frame to invisibility with respect to the artwork. We see the artwork, but we do not see the frame. This is true not only of artworks whose frames tend to understatement, as in modernism, but also those that employ the most assertive physical frames, as in the art of the baroque. How has this situation come about? Is it that we have grown so accustomed to viewing artworks in a seemingly infinite variety of contexts and situations that we no longer see what is there, or fail

to remark on the absence of what is not?7

6 In Mark Rosenthal, Understanding Installation Art: From Duchamp to Holzer (New York: Prestel, 2003) Rosenthal discusses how installation art flows into life without the segregating effects of a frame, pp. 26-27. Although Rosenthal is referring to the immersive quality of installation artworks and how these experiences differ from those involving framed paintings, there is no reference made to ‘extended’ frames or any acknowledgement that the installations in question are themselves framed. 7 Duro, p. 1. 3 Not only do the fourteen wide-ranging essays contained within this book recognise, as Duro states, that “the frame serves to create a space for the artwork that the work in itself is incapable of furnishing”,8 they also promote an expanded notion of the frame and pave the way for further investigation into it.

This thesis takes as its premise a similar assumption made in Museum Studies regarding contemporary art museums: that the frame (like the museum or gallery, which are themselves frames) must continually transform and reinvent itself, keeping critically engaged and responsive to current concepts in contemporary art and modes of presentation to remain relevant.9 In keeping with the necessity to continually reconstruct and redefine the frame, this thesis takes an elaborate and progressive view of framing and the frame to address current approaches to the way art is now being made and presented. Starting on a basic level, this includes updating and extending the gamut of the ‘immediate’ physical frame to include contemporary modes of presentation such as: lightboxes; the mounting of artworks onto various substrates such as aluminium and Perspex; pin and clip devices for securing artworks directly to walls; Perspex sleeves and covers; stretcher frames; protective side strips and sub-frames; propping supports; and artist’s plinths and vitrines.10 Along with the generic box frame, this list of framing options is often the starting point for artists deciding how a contemporary artwork should be framed and presented prior to (or concurrent with) considering the ‘extended’ frame.11

Although frames, plinths, vitrines, lightboxes and other such modes of presentation are regularly discussed in Museum and Curatorial Studies with regard to ‘display’, they are predominantly approached from an extra-artistic perspective with the framing device

8 Ibid., p. 1. 9 For an early example of this see Samuel Cauman, The Living Museum: Experiences of an Art Historian and Museum Director - Alexander Dorner (New York: New York University Press, 1958): “The function of an art museum or other focal institution of our time is, in pragmatist terms, to serve us here and now, to assist in the transformation of society by the creative energies of our moment in time. The living museum holds our past and present together, not by imposing the past upon the present, but by showing its relation to the present...The living museum provides us with means to keep our experiences of movement and of change coherent and unified.” (p. 9). 10 In this thesis I refer to sculpture pedestals, plinths and vitrines as frames because they are often regarded as sculpture’s equivalent to painting’s picture frame. For examples of this analogy being made see: Meyer Schapiro, ‘On Some Problems in the Semiotics of Visual Art: Field and Vehicle in Image - Signs’ in Semiotica (1, 3, 1969), p. 228; Duro, p. 1; and Rosenthal, p. 25. 11 Presentation is not used here to imply a superficial dressing up of artworks for exhibition or any theoretical detachment on the part of the artist. Rather, this thesis takes the view that presentation is a conceptually rigorous exercise that directly affects the reading of an artwork. 4 usually being regarded as external to the artwork or being beyond the sole responsibility of the artist.12 A notable exception to this is James Putnam’s Art and Artifact: The Museum as Medium which is an extensive and compelling survey of contemporary artists who have incorporated museum-style modes of presentation as integral intra- artistic components in their work. However, as Putnam himself asserts, analytical interpretation is avoided with the images of the artworks in his book left to speak largely for themselves.13 What significantly distinguishes my project from Putnam’s is an attempt to provide a method or set of questions to assess the extent to which a mode of presentation is intra- or extra-artistic.

My reason for writing this thesis therefore stems from a gap in literature which specifically covers the contemporary physical frame and the extent to which it colludes with the contemporary artwork. It is a response, more broadly, to a void in research concerned with the reconfiguration of the physical frame in the visual arts. Whilst in recent years there has been a concerted effort amongst art theorists and writers to identify, redefine, and categorise contemporary artforms such as installation art and site- specific artworks,14 there has not - to the best of my knowledge - been a similar attempt to locate, document and categorise the ever-evolving ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ contemporary physical frame. This research aims to go some way to rectifying these areas of neglect, and in doing so, it aims to make a significant contribution to the knowledge base and understanding of contemporary art framing and the physical frame.

With the contemporary frame continually manifesting itself in ways far removed from the traditional picture frame, the reconfiguration of the frame still remains very much a frontier area of research.

12 At some point towards the latter stages of the presentation process it is often assumed (sometimes correctly) that the responsibility for the display of an artwork is transferred - at least in part, but occasionally completely - to a curator and/or exhibition designer. 13 James Putnam, Art and Artifact: The Museum as Medium (London: Thames and Hudson, 2001), p. 7. 14 For two recent attempts to categorise installation art see Rosenthal, and Claire Bishop, Installation Art (London: , 2005). For two recent attempts to redefine and break-down site-specificity see Miwon Kwon, One Place After Another: Site-Specific Art and Locational Identity (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2002), and James Meyer, ‘The Functional Site; or, The Transformation of Site-Specificity’ in Erika Suderburg (ed), Site, Space, Intervention: Situating Installation Art (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000), pp. 23-37. 5 The Frame and its Relevance. Since the ‘artist’s’ frame and the heightened awareness of the physical context in which art is presented and experienced - instigated by the art and writing of artists as diverse as Ford Madox Brown, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Edgar Degas, Georges Seurat, Marcel Duchamp, El Lissitzky, Piet Mondrian, Robert Smithson, Don Judd, Robert Ryman, Joseph Kosuth, Daniel Buren, Louise Lawler and Michael Asher, to name but a few - there has been a growing momentum in the questioning of the relevance of the frame/setting in relation to the artwork (or rather the apparent varying degrees of relevance). This questioning has been pervasive and incessant, penetrating every rigorous (and not so rigorous) interpretation of art in recent times.15

As Sandy Nairne points out in Contemporary Cultures of Display, “Art and exhibitions have evolved together, so that contemporary art cannot be fully understood independently of its presentation”.16 It would therefore be unthinkable to critique a contemporary artwork without questioning its ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ physical frames and the extent to which these influence a reading of the work. If a painting is literally framed, in a traditional sense, how relevant is the frame (post Georges Seurat and Robert Ryman) to the artwork? If a painting is ‘unframed’, is the wall (post Frank Stella and Ryman again) relevant to the composition? How do we know to read the light which falls on to an Agnes Martin or painting as a contributing intra-artistic element, but then to consider it a non-priority to a satisfactory understanding of a painting by, say, Adam Cullen or John Currin? Should the reflections in the Perspex covering a Bill Henson be read as part of the work, or seen as a distraction from it? How are these subtleties of what is ‘in’ and what is ‘out’ encoded or sign- posted within the artwork and its presentation?

This questioning of what constitutes part of the work and what does not, has been approached from various perspectives. As previously mentioned, Derrida has questioned - on a highly theoretical level - whether such a distinction can even be made

15 For an excellent historical account of the artwork’s relationship to the ‘immediate’ (picture) frame as well as to its ‘extended’ (interior décor/architectural) frame see Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts, Frameworks (London: Merrell Holberton, 1996). For a genealogy of site-specificity and the artwork’s relationship to various permutations of ‘site’ see Kwon. 16 Sandy Nairne, ‘Exhibitions of Contemporary Art’ in Emma Barker (ed), Contemporary Cultures of Display (Yale University Press in Association with Open University, 1999), p. 105. 6 between work and frame, inside and outside, text and context. On a more practical level, Martha Buskirk has approached the question of what constitutes the limit of an artwork from a different angle. In her book The Contingent Object of Contemporary Art, Buskirk looks at the ways in which artists utilise things such as certificates (particularly when associated with conceptual works where the certificate is the only tangible evidence of the work), magazine advertisements (when used to announce an artwork, but which then become a kind of artwork in the process), and photographic documentation (particularly when used to record an ephemeral art moment).17 In such instances Buskirk questions “What is the work, and what is the document?”18 It is evident that artists, by initially employing such means to define the physical and conceptual parameters of an artwork, can ironically create a new layer of confusion by adding a surrogate or secondary kind of artwork into the mix.

Ambiguities as to what constitutes part of the artwork have also been approached from a purely framing perspective. John H. Pearson’s notion of an ‘intracompositional’ frame deals directly with the question of whether a frame is sufficiently integral to an artwork to be deemed part of the work or not: if it is, then the frame is ‘intracompositional’; if it is not, then the frame is ‘extracompositional’ (ie., the type of frame that the ‘intracompositional’ frame is not).19 However, this either/or decision would seem to deny the nuances in how varying types of frames relate to their associated works; relationships of any kind are never that simple. To use Gavin Turk’s Stool (1990) as an extreme example (where the artwork actually is a frame), this frame goes beyond the kind of ‘intracompostionality’ that Pearson bestows on George Seurat’s painted abstract borders. The point here being, that in contemporary art - as in previous eras - there are varying degrees of ‘intracompositionality’.

In considering Pearson’s notion of an ‘intracompositional’ frame it becomes apparent that what is needed is a better way of communicating the extent to which a frame relates to (or forms a part of) an artwork: a method, classification system or scale of frames which embraces the question of the frame’s relevance to a work. This is particularly

17 See Martha Buskirk, The Contingent Object of Contemporary Art (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003). 18 Ibid., p. 237. 19 See John H. Pearson, ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’ in Mosaic (23/1, 1990), pp. 15-30. 7 important in relation to the ‘immediate’ frame due to the ‘leap-frogging’ of this area by literature relating to ‘site’ and ‘context’.

A New Model for Looking at the Physical Frame at the Point of Presentation. The following diagram focuses on the ‘immediate’ physical frame and how it relates to its associated artwork(s). It aims to facilitate framing discussion by providing a framing language better equipped to communicate the various ways and extent to which an ‘immediate’ frame contributes to the meaning of a work. The bottom line of the diagram presents a new graduated scale of frames (made up of four new categories) which embraces the question of a frame’s relevance to an artwork in non-binary fashion: the frame is not simply deemed as part of the work or not, conceptually relevant or not, but is evaluated according to the (perceived) extent of the frame’s physical and conceptual involvement with the work. In other words, ambiguities over what constitutes ‘parerga’ are embraced, and a space for discussing varying degrees of ‘intracompositionality’ is opened up.

The model was developed in response to a need to breakdown and analyse the myriad forms and functions of the contemporary ‘immediate’ frame, and in answer to the lack of a suitable existing framework and vocabulary to facilitate in doing so. The approach is therefore conceptual, focusing specifically on the artwork-frame relationship rather than purely on the formal characteristics of the frame in question.

The diagram below shows how the new scale of frames develops upon existing framing categories. Terms which exist beyond this thesis are shown in bold:

8

An Immediate

Frame

An A Ar tist’s Post-Production Frame Frame (an artist-controlled frame) (a frame beyond an artist’s control)

An An Intracompositional Extracompositional Frame Frame (a frame considered to be (a frame not considered to be part of the artwork) part of the artwork)

An An A A Absolute Intrinsic Supplementary Disengaged Frame Frame Frame Frame

9 Another way to visualise the new scale of frames presented in the bottom row of the above diagram is as follows:

An An A A Absolute Intrinsic Supplementary Disengaged ‘Unframed’ Frame Frame Frame Frame

Context of Presentation / Extended Frame(s)

An ‘absolute’ frame. An ‘absolute’ frame refers to an artwork which can be described in its entirety as a physical frame. The removal of the frame would remove all trace of the artwork. Examples of this type of frame include:

Gavin Turk’s Stool (1990). Piero Manzoni’s Socle du Monde (Base of the World) (1961). Gareth Jones’ Modular Plinth (2003).

An ‘intrinsic’ frame. An ‘intrinsic’ frame is considered to be an integral and inseparable part of an artwork in relation to its form, signification and content. It is in some way built into the actual artwork, forming an in-built frame or in-built presentation system. The ‘intrinsic’ frame demarcates the boundary of an artwork from its outer edge. A key defining characteristic is that it constitutes part of what is being presented, rather than frames what is being presented. It is therefore impossible or unthinkable to photographically document or explain the artwork without also representing the frame. The ‘intrinsic’ frame is completely under the control of the artist even when it has been fabricated by 10 someone else. The materials for an ‘intrinsic’ frame are invariably listed on gallery labels and ‘list of works’/room sheets etc. An ‘intrinsic’ frame is so integrated into an artwork that it is (often) almost undetectable as a frame, or rarely acknowledged as such. The removal of an ‘intrinsic’ frame would essentially destroy the artwork. Examples of this type of frame include:

The glass and steel container in Damien Hirst’s A Thousand Years (1990). The refrigeration display case in Marc Quinn’s Eternal Spring (Sunflowers) 1 (1998). The gilded frame in ’ framed mirror Christ and the Lamb (1988). The frame and fixings in many of Robert Ryman’s paintings. The pedestal in Franz West’s Two on a Pedestal (1998).

A ‘supplementary’ frame. A ‘supplementary’ frame is conceived and developed separately from an artwork - often after its completion - but is still considered to be an important (rather than an essential) part of the work. A ‘supplementary’ frame draws attention to itself as well as to what it contains, but it is usually regarded as secondary to what is being presented. Removal of a ‘supplementary’ frame would fundamentally alter the semiotic field of an artwork, but would not completely destroy or nullify it. Artworks with ‘supplementary’ frames are therefore often photographically documented without their frames. However, although there is an obvious separation between a ‘supplementary’ frame and what it presents, it would be incomplete to critique an artwork without also considering its ‘supplementary’ frame. Because ‘supplementary’ frames are neither conceptually inert nor readily replaceable, they require an increased level of care when it comes to the conservation of the work. Examples of artworks with ‘supplementary’ frames include:

Helen Chadwick’s Wreaths to Pleasure series (1992-93). Hany Armanious’ Untitled hair drawings #2-5 (2003). Michael Lindeman’s New York Ghost series (2004). John Spiteri’s An Architect’s Dream (2006). Steven Claydon’s Stocking Cap in Bucholia (2008).

11 A ‘disengaged’ frame. A ‘disengaged’ frame directs attention towards the artwork without ever appearing to be part of the work. It rarely strays from convention and could be said to have aspirations towards ‘neutrality’ or ‘invisibility’. A ‘disengaged’ frame has more of a utilitarian function rather than a conceptual function and is often perceived as part of the museum/gallery furniture. It can usually be removed or replaced without drastically affecting the content or field of the artwork. It is therefore unlikely that a critical review of a work would dwell upon a ‘disengaged’ frame. A ‘disengaged’ frame can still be under the control of the artist, but it is not regarded as part of the artwork or its content.20 Examples include:

Transferable museum box frames for ‘works on paper’. Generic white gallery plinths. Pins for attaching artworks directly to the wall. Standard/plain side strips on canvases.

‘Unframed’. ‘Unframed’ refers to artworks which, in a traditional sense, have no frame. This includes paintings which have no physically attached frames, and sculptures which are presented without supporting plinths or display cases.

‘Context of presentation’. The ‘context of presentation’ refers to the physical setting and context of the installed artwork. This includes (but is not limited to) the visual field surrounding the artwork, the ‘institutional’ frame, and the ‘circumtextual’ features of the artwork in situ. It might otherwise be referred to as the ‘extended’ frame or ‘site’.21

20 This is not to say that this type of frame is void of semiotic content or meta-message. It should also be noted that certain ‘disengaged’ frames may, in years to come, be regarded as having historical or contextual significance, but this would not necessarily alter the dimensions of the actual artwork. 21 The similarities and differences between site, context and frame will be discussed in Chapter 2; see ‘Acknowledging Context, Site and the Frame (Similarities and Differences)’. 12 Chapter Outline. Chapter 1: A Recent History of the Physical Frame and its Functions. This chapter provides a critical history of the physical frame and an overview of recent framing practice. It draws on historical, theoretical and technical research to form a broad supporting base for the thesis. The chapter begins by looking at the history and various functions of the independent picture frame (by far the most common notion of a frame). It goes on to contextualise current framing techniques, styles, and functions, alongside such precedents.

In the latter part of this chapter, the emphasis shifts from the ‘immediate’ frame to the ‘extended’ frame (or more specifically the museum/gallery). The evolution of the white- walled gallery space is looked at in relation to the evolution (or slimming down) of the modern independent frame. Finally, the effects of recent changes in institutional thinking are discussed. With ‘new institutionalism’ resulting in the contemporary museum/gallery now acting as a surrounding frame for a new range of activities and interactions - and thus fulfilling a heightened communal and social function - the gallery is once again in a period of profound self-reflexivity and sustained (re)evaluation.22

Chapter 2: Frame or ‘Frame’? Framing or ‘Framing’? Framed or Frameless? This chapter looks at the scope of the terms frame/‘frame’ and framing/‘framing’ from both a physical and metaphorical perspective within the visual arts and from an interdisciplinary perspective. It looks at how recent theoretical formations of the frame (particularly the ‘circumtextual’ frame) undermine the assumption that open-site artworks, installation art, and so-called ‘boundless’ works of art are frameless. Furthermore, I argue that with art having broken free of traditional conventions such as painting, sculpture and the gallery (essentially making art more ‘life-like’ and harder to recognise), framing has become an increasingly complex and crucial activity: the framing of an artwork often being the difference between consciously experiencing/engaging with a work and subconsciously missing/ignoring it. With the dynamic of much contemporary art relying on the blurring of boundaries between art

22 For a concise overview of ‘new institutionalism’ read Alex Farquharson, ‘Bureaux de Change’ in Frieze (Issue 101, September 2006), pp. 156-159. Also see Claire Doherty, ‘The Institution is Dead! Long Live the Institution! Contemporary Art and New Institutionalism’ in Karen Raney (ed), engage 15 (London: Engage, 2004), pp. 6-13; and Nina Montmann (ed), Art and its Institutions: Current Conflicts, Critique and Collaborations (London: Black Dog, 2006). 13 and life, I contest - contrary to the belief that framing is no longer a relevant activity - that the need for framing has actually increased.

Chapter 3: Contemporary Incarnations of the ‘Immediate’ Physical Frame. This chapter focuses on the ‘immediate’ physical frame in contemporary art (with the majority of examples being post 1990). The selected frames are viewed and discussed through the filter created by the theoretical model presented earlier in the thesis. In order to amplify the benefits of the model, similar frame types have been compared against one another and the differences extracted and articulated. For example, the various uses of plinths by artists such as Gavin Turk, Yuji Takeoka, Jim Lambie, Steven Gontarski, Lionel Bawden, and Gareth Jones (which range between ‘absolute’, ‘intrinsic’ and ‘supplementary’) are looked at alongside plinths which have been employed in a more ‘disengaged’ and/or ‘post-production’ fashion. To demonstrate the versatility of the proposed model, a wide range of frame types have been analysed; these include examples taken from painting, , sculpture, mixed media and new media.

Chapter 4: Exploring the ‘Extended’ Physical Frame. In the first section of this chapter I look at the use of ‘immediate’ frames within art installations by Dave Muller (Thirty-Three Revolutions* (*And One Third), 2005), Gareth Jones (Seven Pages From a Magazine, 1975-2001), Barry McGee (Easy Tonto, 2005), (Like a Dog Returns to its Vomit, 2005), and Chris Ofili (The Upper Room, 2002-2007). I use Claire Bishop’s distinction between “an installation of art” and “a work of installation art” as a filter through which to approach these installations, and as a basis to question the function of the ‘immediate’ frame.23 Is the segregating effect of the ‘immediate’ frame compromised or partially dissolved by the contained artwork’s implication within, and apparent eagerness to partake in, a larger installation artwork? Of particular interest here is how ‘immediate’ frames function within ‘installations’ which are by definition immersive.24

23 See Bishop, p. 6. 24 For an understanding of the immersive nature of installation art see Bishop, “Installation art creates a situation into which the viewer physically enters, and insists that you regard this as a singular entity”, p. 6; and Rosenthal, “the viewer is usually in an enclosed space, swept up in a work of art much larger in expanse than an individual object can normally create”, p. 26. Also see Nicholas de Oliveira, Installation Art in the New Millennium: The Empire of the Senses (London: Thames and Hudson, 2003), pp. 49-53. 14 In the second part of this chapter I look at recent examples of how contemporary artists have incorporated artworks by other artists into their own work and engaged in the process of (re)framing as a mode of art production in its own right. The selected practices (BANK and Goshka Macuga) typify the contemporary convergence between art practice, curating and exhibition design; but do so from the perspective of the artist (or artist-curator) rather than from the perspective of the institutional or independent curator (or curator-artist).25 By focusing on the synthetic exhibition environments created by BANK and Macuga, I question how artworks differentiate themselves from other artworks and negotiate space within their context of presentation - or, more precisely, how this is done for them through processes of framing.26 This section therefore documents how these two idiosyncratic approaches to framing have employed physical frames to create peculiar spaces for artworks.

25 With curators moving inwards to get nearer to the point of production (traditionally the domain of the artist) and with an increasing number of artists moving outwards to explore the ‘extended’ frame (traditionally the territory of the curator) a clean distinction between artist and curator is impossible at times. Artists who have contributed to this fusion include El Lissitzky (who elevated exhibition design to an artform in its own right with Raum fur Konstruktive Kunst, 1926), Marcel Duchamp (who deliberately darkened the gallery for the International Exposition of Surrealism held in in 1938 and issued visitors with torches so that they could see the artworks, and at the First Papers of Surrealism held in New York in 1942 where he covered the room and other artists’ paintings in a web of string), Marcel Broodthaers (who explored the ‘extended’ frame with Musée d’Art Moderne- Département des Aigles, 1968-1972), and Louise Lawler (who included other gallery artists’ works in her one person show An Arrangement of Pictures at Metro Pictures, New York, in 1982). More recent examples of artists who have incorporated other artists’ artworks into their own work include Richard Deacon, Franz West, Jim Shaw, Mark di Suvero and Rirkrit Tiravanija. Artists who have encroached upon curatorial territory by organising exhibitions are too numerous to attempt to list but include Susan Hiller (Dream Machines, 2000) and Maurizio Cattelan (Berlin Biennale 4, 2006: co-curated with Massimiliano Gioni and Ali Subotnick). Curators or institutional figures historically responsible for today’s notion of the curator-as-artist include Alexander Dorner (who commissioned El Lissitzky to design Kabinett der Abstrakten, 1927-1928), and Harald Szeemann (whose curatorship of Documenta 5 in 1972 ignited fierce debate about the increasingly audible ‘voice’ of the curator). More recently, curators such as Hans Ulrich Obrist, Nicolas Bouriaud, Maria Lind and Charles Esche have eroded the distance between the point of art production and the point of presentation or consumption, thus bringing the creative moment of the artist and curator ever more close. 26 The differentiation of artworks verses the synthesis of the exhibition environment as a total artwork has been a concern for artists, curators and exhibition designers at least since El Lissitzky’s Demonstrationsraumes in the 1920s. For an excellent account of how Lissitzky’s raums differentiated artworks see Maria Gough’s informative essay ‘Constructivism Disorientated: El Lissitzky’s Dresden and Hannover Demonstrationraume’ in Nancy Perloff and Brian Reed (eds), Situating El Lissitzky: Vitebsk, Berlin, Moscow (Los Angeles: Getty Publications, 2003), pp. 77-125. 15

Chapter 1: A Recent History of the Physical Frame and its Functions.

Functions of the Independent Picture Frame.

The independent picture frame as we know it, developed at the beginning of the Italian Renaissance. It flourished as an art form in Italy during the 16th century, spread to neighboring European countries, and reached its zenith in 18th-century Paris.1

The independent picture frame, which is also referred to as the ‘applied’, ‘separated’, ‘moveable’ or ‘literal’ frame, is a relatively recent invention with its origins stemming, as Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts claim, from twelfth-century carved wooden frames designed “to display, celebrate and enhance the altarpiece”.2 These early altarpiece frames evolved between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries becoming more and more elaborate and ornamental, whilst often retaining much of their ecclesiastic and architectural character. Many of the earlier painted panels contained within these frames were formed from the same piece of timber as the frame: the panel being a carved recess, which was then sized and gessoed in preparation for the painting, whilst the raised rim or bevel served to frame the painting.3 The shift to a physically independent frame started to happen during the early Renaissance when the “tools and carpentry techniques became more sophisticated and the output of paintings increased dramatically”.4 W. H. Bailey cites Gentile da Fabriano’s Adoration of the Magi (1423) [Figure 1] as the first altarpiece made with panel and frame in two separate pieces.5 As Henry Heydenryk points out in The Art and History of Frames: An Inquiry into the Enhancement of Paintings it was realised that ‘applied’ frames made from separate bits

1 Jennifer Janicki, Glorious Borders: Three Centuries of French Frames (Washington: Gold Leaf Studios, 1999), p. 2. 2 Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts, Frameworks (London: Merrell Holberton, 1996), p. 26. Piers Feetham and Caroline Feetham claim in The Art of Framing (London: Ryland Peters and Small, 1997) that the earliest carved and gilded frames were “the great structures that housed the altarpieces of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries”, p. 11. 3 Feetham and Feetham, p. 12. 4 Robert Cunning, The Encyclopedia of Picture Framing Techniques (London: Quarto Publishing, 1993), p. 164. 5 W. H. Bailey, Defining Edges: A New Look at Picture Frames (New York: Abrams, 2002), p. 23. 16

of wood could offer the painted wooden surface far more protection against warping and cracking, and it was hence that the independent frame was born.6

Figure 1: Gentile da Fabriano, Adoration of the Magi (1423), tempura on wood, 3000 x 2820 mm.

To continue Heydenryk’s technical point, one of the key pragmatic functions of the independent frame is to offer protection for the artwork. It helps to prevent the surface and edges of a painted canvas or ‘work on paper’ from being damaged during display or storage. The frame also provides fixing points for the artwork to be attached to the wall and, as is the case with many traditional frames, the frame provides a surface on to which identifying plaques can be attached. Here the painting and independent frame - complete with attached plaque(s) bearing the painting’s title, date of production and

6 Henry Heydenryk, The Art and History of Frames: An Inquiry into the Enhancement of Paintings (London: Nicolas Vane, 1963), p. 13. 17

artist’s name - attained a self-contained ‘moveability’ which characterised paintings from the Renaissance right up to the onset of modernism.

To dwell on such practical aspects of the frame such as protection, fixings and identification, though, is to deny the frame of its more dynamic and various functions.

The frame as a material reinforcement of [the] edge functions first and foremost as a device for distinguishing or setting off a certain kind of space - aesthetic space - from the surrounding area. Constituting a limit or boundary between the ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ of an art-form, it demarcates a perceptual field within which what is being looked at signifies differently.7

The ability of the frame to define or demarcate an area as significant is so deeply ingrained within Western visual culture that it is difficult to look at what a frame contains without first experiencing a feeling of heightened expectation and awareness. The mind engages differently - more analytically, more poetically and more critically - to what is inside the frame, than to what is outside the frame. As Christine Traber points out, “No matter what its appearance, the frame is always a conventional sign indicating that what it surrounds is out of the ordinary”.8

The notion of the frame as an isolating device which separates the artwork from the outside world and demarcates an area as a place of artistic activity - creating what Meyer Schapiro has referred to as “a homogenous enclosure like a city wall”9 - is perhaps most apparent in paintings which utilise perspective to create a singular mimetic pictorial scene. It is here that the celebration of, or differences between, reality and non-reality are most pronounced and that the frame functions so effectively to

7 Gale MacLachlan and Ian Reid, Framing and Interpretation (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1994), p. 23. 8 Christine Traber, ‘In Perfect Harmony? Escaping the Frame in the Early 20th Century’ in Eva Mendgen (ed), In Perfect Harmony: Picture and Frame 1850-1920 (Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum, 1995), p. 226. 9 Meyer Schapiro, ‘On Some Problems in the Semiotics of Visual Art: Field and Vehicle in Image - Signs’ in Semiotica (1, 3, 1969), p. 227. 18

articulate and enhance illusionistic space.10 Shapiro goes on to say that “When salient and when enclosing pictures with perspective views, the frame sets the picture surface back into depth and helps to deepen the view; it is like a window frame through which is seen a space behind the glass”.11

The notion of the picture frame as a window frame is a recurring one. Some contemporary painters such as continue to utilise this metaphor as a way of conditioning the viewer’s approach to his paintings, many of which are inspired by views from windows. In a similar way, the ‘room-with-a-view’ picture window has been recently used as an internal framing device by Jeff Wall in his A View From an Apartment (2004-05) [Figure 2]. Also, within the framing industry, the cut-out hole of the matboard surround is understandably (but unimaginatively) referred to as a window. Bailey devotes a chapter to the frame-as-window in his book Defining Edges - a New Look at Picture Frames.12 He also notes that once we are within the realm of the artwork - usually facilitated by the frame - the role of the frame shifts to one of a security guard ensuring that we spend all the time we need actively engaged with the artwork. The frame, as Bailey asserts, “must invite us in” and then “prevent us from escaping its bounds”.13

10 The segregating effect of framing is also evident when considering the fragility of the ‘readymade’ in relation to its physical context, but in such a case the frame’s function is amplified through the separation of like from like, rather than reality from non-reality. Rico Franses discusses the crucial task of the frame to separate not the image from the world, but one image from another image (ie., like from like) in his essay ‘Postmonumentality: Frame, Grid, Space, Quilt’ in Paul Duro (ed), The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 263. 11 Schapiro, p. 227. 12 Bailey, pp. 30-41. 13 Ibid., p. 17. 19

Figure 2: Jeff Wall, A View From An Apartment (2004-05), transparency and lightbox, 1670 x 2440 mm.

The analogy of the picture frame as a proscenium arch in a theatre further asserts the traditional segregating role of the frame:

No one who has visited an old theatre can ignore the degree to which the ornate proscenium arches (frames) were integral to the comprehension of the spectacles that were staged in such buildings. Nor was it by chance that a great deal of interchange took place between the theatrical devices of framing and the devices used in the Visual Arts. In both cases the frame around the image/scene was important in suggesting to the viewer that they were in the presence of certain types of illusionary space.14

The Frame acts as a sort of proscenium arch and, when the curtain rises, all outside the frame is the everyday world, all inside is magic, make-believe - a world of imagination.15

14 Michael Carter, Framing Art: Introducing Theory and the Visual Image (Sydney: Hale & Iremonger, 1990), pp. 164-165. 15 Timothy Clifford, ‘The Historical Approach to the Display of Paintings’ in The International Journal of Museum Management and Curatorship (I, 1982), p. 96. 20

The type of frame being characterised here - one of a “marker of limits”,16 a “frontier”,17 a “tectonic border”18 - functions to close off that which it contains, from that which contains it. Its function is to isolate its contents, demarcating them as fundamentally different, or in the case of mimetic painting and theatre, illusionary and fictional. A boundary is set between the encoded space inside the frame and the quotidian world outside, and we (the viewer) experience what is on offer within the frame through our compliant ‘immersion’ into it. In such instances, the frame becomes a symbol of our desire to be engulfed in another world - to escape. Entry into the painting or acted scene - into the ‘reality’ of what is being represented - being reliant therefore upon the psychological crossing of the frame’s threshold. Here the fictional scene or illusionary image can momentarily become ‘real’.

Traber notes how visitors to the Salon of 1763, Paris, were recommended to look at exhibited paintings through a special field glass which shut out everything except the painted canvas; by doing so, they were advised, they could achieve the greatest possible sense of illusion and therefore experience complete submersion into the ‘reality’ of the painting.19 Such measures would of course seem drastic or inappropriate for contemporary painting, although there are clear comparisons to be made with contemporary installation art - which is immersive by definition.20 Ilya Kabakov claims that the origins of East European installation lie in painting, where “the viewer falls into the painting, makes the passage to the other side of the glass”, thereby ‘entering’ into the pictorial scene. He goes on to state that Eastern European installation is therefore orientated towards space and atmosphere, much like the paintings to which he refers.21 Essentially what the use of the field glass at the Salon of 1763 was trying to achieve was to remove all competing distractions from the artwork in order to allow the viewer to ‘enter’ and experience the exclusive space and atmosphere of the exhibited paintings. This editing out of competing distractions remains fundamental to the presentation and display of much contemporary art. In fact both the ‘white cube’ and the more recent

16 See Christopher Norris, ‘Deconstruction, Post-Modernism and the Visual Arts’ in Christopher Norris and Andrew Benjamin, What is Deconstruction? (London: Academy Editions, 1988), p. 17. 17 See Traber in Mendgen, p. 221. 18 See John H. Pearson, ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’ in Mosaic (23/1, 1990), p. 17. 19 Traber in Mendgen, p. 226. 20 See, for example, Claire Bishop, Installation Art (London: Tate, 2005), p. 6. 21 Ilya Kabakov, ‘On installations 1994 and 2000’ in Charles Harrison and Paul Wood (eds), Art in Theory, 1900-2000, An Anthology of Changing Ideas (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2003), p. 1179. 21

blacked-out gallery space for installation bear testament to such distraction- cleansing sensibilities. A utilitarian object (a packing crate or chair for instance) that has been placed too close to an artwork in a white-walled gallery is likely to be removed quite quickly so as not to detract attention away from the work on show. Similarly, a slight gap in a curtain allowing daylight into a darkened video installation would be viewed as a distracting ‘frame-break’.

However, although the frame as an impenetrable border or definitive break-from-the- norm allows geometric-optical perspective and other coded systems to operate more smoothly, ultimately the frame as a hermetically sealed boundary separating A from B is itself illusory. It relies on a suspension of disbelief that what is inside the frame is somehow separable and autonomous from what is outside the frame - which essentially it always and inescapably forms a part of.

As Paul Duro points out, the frame as impermeable border rhetoricizes too distinct a relationship between inside and outside:

... the devices that mark the limit of representation cannot be considered in isolation from what they enframe on the one hand, and from what surrounds the frame on the other. The supposed opposition between work and frame serves only to conceal the instability of the relation… We should construe the work/frame as the indissociable/indefinable unity through which our notions of reality and truth, our expectations and desires, are given an

(illusory) coherence.22

Duro’s position is attributable, at least in part, to Jacques Derrida’s critique of Immanuel Kant’s notion of a ‘parergonal’ frame which characterises the physical picture frame as something additional or extrinsic to the artwork. In his essay ‘Parergon’, Derrida sets about undermining Kant’s rigid distinctions, exposing along the way, the inside-outside paradox of the picture frame. The ‘parergonal’ frame, Derrida states, “stands out against two grounds” (the work, and the wall), “but with respect to each of these two grounds, it

22 Duro, p. 8. 22

merges into the other”.23 Through this example, Kant’s ‘parergonal’ (picture) frame is presented as both extrinsic and intrinsic to the work.

MacLachlan and Reid put it like this:

... think of a painting hung in a public space. Vis-a-vis the gallery wall, its border seems to belong to the interior of the artwork, but vis-a-vis the

painted surface it seems part of the surroundings.24

However, the frame’s merge into its surroundings is not always as uniform and characterless as it would first seem. When the above quotation is applied to a more contemporary incarnation of the physical frame, such as the glass container in Damien Hirst’s A Thousand Years (1990) [Figure 3] for example, the outcome is less clear-cut.

Figure 3: Damien Hirst, A Thousand Years (1990), glass, steel, MDF, cow’s head, flies, maggots, insect-o-cutor, sugar, water, 2130 x 4270 x 2130 mm.

Hirst’s A Thousand Years consists of a rotting cow’s head, maggots, flies and an insect- o-cutor encased within a divided glass and steel container. The maggots hatch into blue bottles in one side of the container before flying through small holes to get to the other

23 See Jacques Derrida (translated by Geoff Bennington & Ian McLeod), The Truth in Painting (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 61. 24 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 16. 23

part of the container. Here, the flies feed on the cow’s head, mate, lay eggs and eventually get zapped by the insect-o-cutor in what has eloquently described as a “dismal spectacle, of sordid circumstance and elegantly framed putrefaction”.25

Despite the glass container’s allusion to an extrinsic ‘parergonal’ museum display case, Hirst’s glass and steel frame obstinately resists merging into the milieu with anything like the force expected of a traditional picture frame or museum vitrine. Furthermore, unlike the picture frame discussed by Derrida and MacLachlan and Reid, it can not so easily be claimed that Hirst’s in-built container (frame) stands out against two grounds (the work, and the wall or its surrounds) because the container actually constitutes an ‘intrinsic’ part of the work. To say that it stands out against the work would appear to make little sense. The glass container no more stands out against the work than does the rotting cow’s head, or the insect-o-cutor.

Hirst’s frame marks the artwork’s physical limit from its outer edge, whereas a ‘parergonal’ frame does so from its inner edge. Therefore, when or if Hirst’s ‘intrinsic’ frame merges into its surrounds, it does so reluctantly and from a slightly different position than from that of a ‘parergonal’ or ‘extracompositional’ frame. And, crucially, it does so whilst constantly asserting its own more overt ‘intrinsic’ nature.

This discussion of the varying ways that physical frames relate to their associated artworks and to their surrounds, draws attention to a key traditional function or aim of a picture frame: that the frame should not only isolate an artwork within its border, but it should also concurrently bind it to its environment.

The function of these material borders was to isolate and protect the image against encroachment from the surrounding space. At the same time, frames in their earliest forms were designed to harmonise with their architectural or decorative surroundings, providing a link or a transition space between the

two.26

25 Sarah Kent, Shark Infested Waters: The Saatchi Collection of British Art in the 90s (London: Zwemmer, 1994), p. 36. 26 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 20. 24

Mitchell and Roberts note how early ‘moveable’ frames were connected with architecture through a common ornamental language, with the frame’s decorative motifs and continuous bands of ornamentation often being “adopted from architectural prototypes”. The inter-relationship between the frame and architecture was evident throughout the Renaissance with the inclusion of lintels and columns in ‘tabernacle’ and ‘aedicular’ style frames, as well as the extensive use of the decorated frieze in the ‘cassetta’ and ‘architrave’ frames which proliferated at that time.27

Similar connections can be made between the frame and interior decor. This is very apparent in French frames under the reign of Louis XV who unlike his grandfather and father (Louis XIII and Louis XIV), as Janicki notes, “showed little interest in building and architecture”. Under Louis XV, interior decoration and the decorative arts became more prevalent, with wall paneling, doorways, ceilings and furniture being covered in flamboyant “scrollwork, tendrils, shells and other organic elements” [see Figure 4].28 Parallels can of course be made between other distinctive frame styles and concurrent interior decor and furniture styles. For example, seventeenth-century Dutch ebonised frames correspond closely to Dutch furniture of that time; and the exuberantly carved frames of Grinling Gibbons (1648-1721) directly relate to the carved interiors, cornices and over-mantels of his era (many of which, as Piers and Carloine Feetham point out, Gibbons was also responsible for carving) [see Figure 5].29 In a similar way, the contemporary box frame corresponds closely with the clean lines and minimal aesthetic of both the contemporary art gallery and current domestic interior design.

27 Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, pp. 26-27. 28 Janicki, p. 6. 29 Feetham and Feetham, p. 22. 25

Figure 4: The Salon de L’Abondance in the palace of Versailles, France.

Figure 5: Petworth House in Sussex, England, with carved frames and surrounds by Grinling Gibbons.

26

The function of the frame to both separate and bind is described by Germano Celant in his essay ‘Framed: Innocence or Gilt?’ using the notion of the frame firstly as a ‘cut’ which detaches the painted canvas from its original context, effectively lacerating it from the body of art, and then a ‘scar’ which functions by reconnecting the lacerated canvas. The ‘cut’ - according to Celant – “makes possible the condition of artistic ‘diversity’, and is the origin of the power of art”. It then forms a ‘scar’ or thickening which functions both as a pronounced boundary to protect the severed canvas and as a bind or defence against its complete isolation by linking it to its new environment. Celant continues that “Once it is established that the art space draws its ‘reality’ from a cut and a scar… the visual representation becomes a detached product” which, in turn, creates a visual opening in the wall or architecture. It follows, Celant states, “that the frame should be an architectural fragment in harmony with the building of which it is part”, and consequently has the potential to not only set-off and elevate the painting which it contains, but also enhance the building which contains it.30

The frame can also reference less physical contexts than its material surroundings. In Thomas Eakins’ Portrait of Professor Henry A Rowland (1897) [Figure 6], Eakins has adorned the frame with scientific symbols in an attempt to connect the sitter, Professor Rowland, to his achievements within the area of . The binding function of the frame is clearly visible here, as is the artist’s desire to mediate the reception of his painting through the framing process.31

30 See Germano Celant, ‘Framed: Innocence or Gilt?’ in Artforum (Vol. 20, March, 1982), pp. 49-51. 31 See Pearson, p. 22. 27

Figure 6: Thomas Eakins, Portrait of Professor A Rowland (1897), oil on canvas, artist’s frame, 2030 x 1372 mm.

Where the flamboyantly carved frames of the Baroque and the highly ornate frames of Grinling Gibbons can be regarded as ‘sculptor’s’ frames or ‘carver’s’ frames, more simple frame forms can be aligned with or accredited to the workshops of the cabinetmaker. Mitchell and Roberts point out that it is because of their origin that these ‘cabinetmaker’s’ frames tended to be designed like door and window frames, and could 28

therefore be effectively used as trompe l’oeil devices to enhance the illusion that what is being seen through the frame is in fact the genuine view from a window. Mitchell and Roberts give as an example a fifteenth-century architecturally derived frame which was designed for Hans Memling’s Christ Blessing (circa 1485-1490) [Figure 7]. The frame has a bevelled rainsill for its bottom lateral side to imitate those found in church windows. The painted life-size head and torso of Christ virtually fills the frame whilst his left hand rests gently on the rainsill, enhancing the effect for the observer of a genuine one-on-one religious encounter.32

Figure 7: Hans Memling, Christ Blessing (circa 1485-1490), oil on panel, 348 x 262 mm.

The effect of Christ’s hand on the rainsill changes the dynamic of the frame quite significantly. The frame can no longer be described clearly as belonging to the physical space of the viewer, as would be the case with an architectural or window-like frame around a painted landscape. The presence of Christ’s hand on the rainsill appears to

32 Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, pp. 88-89. 29

claim the frame equally as part of the illusory world of the painting. In this instance, the frame acts to blur the boundary between these two traditionally distinct spaces.

As Shapiro notes, frames act as “finding and focussing” devices.33 They attract and lead the eye in, and when handled well, emphasis and enhance what they contain. Traditional gold water-gilded frames compound this by picking up surrounding light creating a bright halo which draws attention to the frame and its contents, attracting passing interest in much the same way as does an illuminated sign.

The ability of the frame to grab attention was not lost on early exhibiting in the Philadelphia Salon shows at the turn of the twentieth century:

To Hartmann, another symptom of the failure of the salons was found in the increased use of loud or ostentatious framing. “As a collection of prints would simply become intolerable if all were restricted to a certain pattern”, Hartmann disparaged, “everybody … is allowed to mount and frame his work to suit his own fancy. This naturally results in drawing attention at times to inferior work, as a print on a red mount or in an odd or elaborate frame is more conspicuous than those which are framed in a more subdued

fashion.34

The profile or cross-section of the frame also plays a role in how we see the artwork, as do the type of joints used for the frame’s corners. A small wide frame with mitred corner joints leads the eye inwards by appearing to create depth through the illusion of receding perspective lines, whereas the same frame with lap joints creates a more shallow or flat setting. Actual depth can be achieved through the use of a frame which slopes inwards from a higher outer edge to a shallower inner edge (or ‘sight’ edge). This again has the effect of drawing the eye inwards, focusing attention on the frame’s contents. Another consideration is the relative size of the frame to the artwork. Generally speaking, the wider the frame’s moulding in relation to the frame’s overall size, the greater the effect of the artwork’s isolation. In Salon shows where artworks

33 Schapiro, p. 227. 34 Jeff Rosen, ‘Strategies of Containment: The Manipulation of the Frame in Contemporary Photography’ in Afterimage (Vol. 17, No. 5, December, 1989), p. 17, footnote 27. In his text, Rosen is quoting art critic Sadakichi Hartmann (1867-1944) from ‘On Exhibitions’ in Notes 5 (No. 2, October 1901), p. 109. 30

were hung in close proximity to one another, the frame helped to prevent seepage or trace elements from one work entering another. The wider the frame, the less the chance of content migration and inter-artwork contamination. Bailey points out the competitive undercurrent of the European Salon shows stating that as artists “vied for attention from patrons and members of the public”, artists chose disproportionately “wide frames to keep the competition at bay and to enable the viewer to focus on their own work”.35

One of the lesser considered dynamics or functions of heavily carved and composition frames is how their decorative corners (cartouches) and prominent centres and demi- centres inter-play with the composition of the paintings which they surround. Mitchell and Roberts give two examples of how elaborate protruding embellishments create horizontal, vertical and diagonal cross axis which set up a dialogue between painting and frame [see Figures 8 and 9].36 In these examples (both portraits) the structure and composition of the paintings are reinforced by their frames, with the implied lines criss- crossing each painting, and clearly framing the prime focal points.

Figure 8 (left): Spanish bolection frame with gilt foliate corners and centres, contemporary for: Diego Velazquez, Portrait of Don Pedro de Barberana (1631-3), oil on canvas, 1981 x 1114 mm.

Figure 9 (right): English convex-panel frame with raised flower-foliage corners, centres, and demi-centres, original for: Sir Godfrey Kneller, Dorothy Mason, Lady Brownlow (circa 1664 - 1700), oil on canvas, 2390 x 1420 mm.

35 Bailey, p. 16. 36 See Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, p. 120 and 147. 31

In a less intricate sense, through processes of selection and rejection, an artist is able to control what he or she reveals to (or conceals from) an audience through its inclusion within (or exclusion from) the frame. And as Shapiro points out, the frame enables artists to position focal points and centre objects:

Where there is no boundary of the field, as in cave paintings and unframed images on rocks or large walls, we center the image in our view; in the bounded field the center is predetermined by the boundaries or frame and the isolated figure is characterized in part by its place in the field. When stationed in the middle it has another quality for us than when set at the side…37

So the frame not only functions as a ‘finding and focusing’ device for the viewer but also acts as a ‘positioning and ’ device for the artist. Artists, through their positioning of the frame (establishing an edge, as is the case with the photographic ‘frame’) or through their positioning of things within the frame (the composition) dictate and prioritise information for the viewer to interpret.

Shapiro points out how the frame enters into the shaping of the image, citing Edgar Degas and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec as ingenious masters in the practice of cutting and foregrounding objects “oddly at the frame” so that the represented field appears to be less contained by its border.38 In such instances, the frame seems to play a far more active and dynamic role than when the frame neatly centres its focal points: as is the case, for example, with more classically composed portrait and still life paintings. As Pearson points out, Degas’ technique through its suggestion that the pictorial field “has infinite extension beyond the spectator’s range of vision, … calls attention to the power of the artist to delineate a particular composition”.39

Although the picture frame can be utilised to create space and spatial tensions in a kind of collaboration with the image, the frame can also function by priming the viewer’s approach and mood in a more independent fashion, almost irrespective of the artwork. The following quotation is from Mark Davis, professional picture framer and framing

37 Schapiro, p. 229. 38 Ibid., p. 227. 39 Pearson, p. 19. 32

consultant, who is responsible for maintaining ornate nineteenth-century frames at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York:

[Premodern] frames are so powerful and strong that they help to gear the eye to the painter’s level of intensity. We live in an age that’s suspicious of carving, but carving really sets a painting off, disrupting the sense of a solid, single plane. It might even be the subduing thing that lets you see the painting more easily.40

It should be stressed, however, that the ability of carved gilt frames to tune the approach of the viewer (and “gear the eye to the painter’s level of intensity”) must be balanced against the semiotic by-products of such a frame.

There is, for example, in the Art Gallery of Western Australia a small dark painting of a nativity scene by the seventeenth-century painter Carlo Maratti which seems overwhelmed by an enormous black frame with flamboyant gilt leaves at each corner. Given its relative flatness and total lack of harmony with the scene depicted, such a frame appears to have no other function than to designate, through its gilded opulence, the paintings ‘old master’ status and hence to signal its cultural and economic worth. Heavy, ornate gilt frames whose size and decoration often add nothing to the aesthetic enhancement of paintings can therefore be thought of as ‘value- added’ frames.41

It is in such instances, as Celant notes, that the frame’s autonomous order which exists independently of whatever it contains is made clear: “one can no longer avoid the problem of the frame as an independent object with its own grammar”.42

The ‘value-added’ frame acts as a signifier of prestige, wealth and importance. It enhances - or rather contributes - to what it contains, not through its formal-optical relationship with the artwork, but through its extra-artistic participation in what Pearson

40 Davis in Rosen, p. 16. 41 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 22. 42 Celant, p. 53. 33

refers to as the “semiotics of economy”.43 The carved water-gilded frame is still (even today) a conventional sign of ‘high’ art. It comes steeped in a history of religious and royal patronage, museums and aristocratic collections, which in turn produce, as Carter notes, “associations of age, importance, and ‘old masterishness’”.44

The ‘value-added’ frame can function quite literally to add monetary value to a painting-frame package. Janicki notes that the complexity of the carving in Rococo frames and the subsequent challenge to gilders meant that it was not unusual for the cost of a frame to exceed the cost of the painting.45 However it is the frame’s ability to add cultural weight and aesthetic worth to an artwork - through means other than by simply contributing intrinsic economic value relative to the cost of the frame’s production - that is theoretically more engaging.

Rosen points out how photographers at the turn of the twentieth century employed similar framing standards as those which applied to etching and painting to help audiences identify their as art.46 At a similar point in time it was common for dealers to (re)frame Impressionist paintings in antique French frames to give what was effectively a new and innovative painting style “instant authority and gravitas”. This strategy of framing the unfamiliar using a familiar style of frame would have, as Mitchell and Roberts suggest, “helped the modern masters ‘settle down’ in the company of Old Masters”.47

If, as MacLachlan and Reid assert, ‘value-added’ frames “communicate ‘meta- messages’ … that tell us how to evaluate or interpret what they enclose”,48 then the ‘trophy’ frame is perhaps the epitome of this. These grandiloquently styled gilt-wood settings (usually reserved for portraits) were often utilised according to the perceived importance and social status of the person depicted; but they were also dictated by the painting’s intended recipient [see Figures 10 and 11].

43 Pearson, p. 17. 44 Carter, p. 164. 45 Janicki, pp. 6-7. 46 Rosen, p. 14. 47 Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, p. 170. 48 See MacLachlan and Reid, p. 22. 34

Figure 10: Rococo trophy frame original for: Jean-Baptiste Van Loo, Portrait of Louis XV (late 1720s), oil on canvas, 2320 x 1730 mm.

35

Figure 11: Swedish Baroque trophy frame circa 1700-10 carved to a design attributed to Nicodemus Tessin the Younger, for: David Klocker Ehrenstrahl, King Charles XI of Sweden (circa 1680), oil on canvas, 820 x 660 mm.

36

The most opulent and strikingly adorned frames of all were, naturally, those made for paintings of the monarch (and there was a hierarchy even amongst these, depending upon the recipient of the work - whether it was intended for another monarch, a prelate, an ambassador, a courtier, a provincial governor or official, or whether it was to be hung within the king’s own palace). After members of the royal family, military figures probably came next in terms of the elaboration of their frames... Portraits of the clergy gave the sculptor less imaginative latitude, but they still form a small but important class of paintings with trophy frames.49

It is not just opulent carved gilt frames, however, that can prime the response of the viewer by communicating that what they contain is of a certain standard and/or importance. A contemporary comparison can be found in box frames, or rather in the hierarchy of these supposedly generic and minimal frames.

A trained eye can quickly distinguish between an inferior custom-made frame (a ‘cut- and-shut’ frame, for example, made from pre-finished moulding with a non-archival mount) and a more specialised frame (which has been hand-finished, with a frame- package that adheres to strict conservation practice). And the viewer inevitably, if subliminally, picks up on the quality of the frame and relates it back to other works which they might have seen in similar quality frames. A fairly unremarkable drawing by an emerging or little-known artist can miraculously appear quite convincing when placed in a ‘museum-standard’ frame - if only by the frame’s ability to convey the aspirations and serious intentions of the artist involved (or those of the dealer handling that artist).50 This ‘museumising’ of artworks to imply significance and potential status is not uncommon, and certainly not always sub-conscious.51

49 Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, p. 247. 50 I am not so much referring here to ‘in-house’ museum framing styles, but rather to the frame styles and standards adopted by artists currently exhibiting within museums who, more often than not, use specialised ‘high-end’ frame-makers. 51 James Putnam uses the word ‘museumize’ to describe the effect of placing something in a vitrine: see James Putnam, Art and Artifact: The Museum as Medium (London: Thames and Hudson, 2001), p. 36. I use ‘museumising’ here to suggest a more brazen attempt to add kudos to an artwork. 37

It is not always easy, however, to predict the reception of a frame. Rosen writes about how some postmodern artists in the 1980s repudiated the “mass-produced industrial materials that [had] characterized modernist framing practices” in favour of hand painted wooden frames which were “unmatched and oddly joined”. What might have been seen as a critique of the slick packaging and commodification of works of art, could also have been interpreted, paradoxically, as a way of trying to enhance the artwork’s “consumer appeal” by offering it the status of a unique ‘one-of-a-kind’ artwork in a unique ‘one-of-a-kind’ frame.52 The amateur handicraft aesthetic is thus seen here to have two very different effects.

It would seem from this that the independent frame is destined to commodify the artwork. The frame has traditionally functioned by amplifying the ‘completeness’ and ‘resolvedness’ of a work, signaling to the potential consumer that it is ‘ready to go’. Once framed, the artwork is - at least in theory - infinitely more durable, and can be placed in the most challenging of settings safe in the knowledge that it is surrounded by a visual and contextual break. The independent picture frame encloses the encoded space and acts as a mediator of meaning. It clears the way for the work, and when handled well, provides it with sufficient transportable contemplative space.

The Absorption of the Frame into the Artwork. The osmosis of the ‘parergonal’ picture frame into the artwork began to happen from about the mid-nineteenth century with what is commonly referred to as the ‘artist’s’ frame. This was when painters started to take more control of the ‘settings’ for their canvases by making or designing their own frames to extend and/or complement their own paintings.53 In the four-hundred years prior to this, the creative processes of painting and framing had happened independently and both were seen as entirely different enterprises, the former carried out by an artist, the latter by a craftsperson or artisan. Although there is often a degree of harmony between paintings and frames before the late nineteenth century, and a strong case can be made for not separating early paintings from their original frames,54 it would be problematic to claim that such frames can be truly integral to their paintings unless the production of the frame was

52 Rosen, p. 16. 53 There was however a degree of tension between artist and dealer over what constituted an appropriate frame and ‘control’ was often compromised, as will be discussed later in this chapter. 54 This point is argued in Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, pp. 6-9. 38

fully under the control and guidance of the artist.55 And even then, the frame would have to be incorporated into the work in such a way as to clearly transcend ‘parergonality’.

Referring to seventeenth-century Dutch frames in his article ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’, Pearson puts it like this:

In the visual arts, a small group of seventeenth-century Dutch artisans manufactured unusual picture frames that were consonant in colour and pattern with the paintings for which they were designed. In effect, however, these early types of frames remove the composition further from the artist by interposing an alien presence. The Dutch picture frames embed the artist’s composition in another craftsman’s supplemental translation or interpretation of the framed work.56

Although from our current perspective, we are looking at how the frame has been pulled into the artwork by the artist, it is equally appropriate to discuss how the artwork has expanded outwards to engulf the frame. The important point here being that through the unfolding of events and developments instigated by the ‘artist’s’ frame, the relationship between the painting and its frame - in certain instances - went from being a kind of symbiotic relationship to an osmotic kind of relationship. In other words, at times, the painting and the frame became intertwined in a more unitary and profound way than had previously been the case.

55 Framing that occurs after the artist has relinquished control is referred to in this thesis as ‘post- production’ framing. This should not be confused with ‘post’ framing. The differences between these two framing terms will become clear in chapter 2. 56 Pearson, p. 16. 39

The Politics of Framing from the Late Nineteenth Century to the Present.

Desire for lasting control of the art work as a semiotic field and an economic good has been long shared by painters and writers, who usually lose control of their canvases and narratives once the process of creation yields to the process of consumption.57

Celant has pointed out in his article ‘Framed: Innocence or Gilt?’, that during the late nineteenth century, artists started to regard the frame’s extra-artistic content or “grammar” as an “intrusive presence” and attempted “to resolve the issue of the coexistence of painting and frame” by taking authorial control of the latter, thereby incorporating the border into the work itself.58 However, where Celant regarded the absorption of the frame into the artwork as an attempt by artists to create a more harmonious and controlled optical and semiotic environment for their paintings, Pearson portrays a more acrimonious struggle for control of the artwork between artist (the producer) and patron (the consumer).

‘Intracompositional’ frames, as Pearson states, “bespeak a desire to integrate artist, art work and spectator/reader; they seek to bring creation, product and consumption within one frame that would not exclude or deny any part of the esthetic process”.59 In other words, Pearson identifies in late nineteenth-century artists a desire to extend the boundary of their artistic practices to incorporate the ‘post-production’ realms of presentation and reception as a way of maintaining control of their work beyond the process of creation and into the process of consumption. This push by artists to extend and harness the latter stages of artistic production was fuelled by a growing awareness and resentment amongst artists relating to how their artworks were being mediated and appropriated once their work had left the studio.

The frame thus became a site of struggle for authority with, on the one side, the artist who wanted his or her artwork to reach its point of consumption uninhibited by the

57 Ibid., p. 15. 58 Celant, p. 53. 59 Pearson, p. 16. 40

mediating forces of ‘secondary coding’ and, on the other side, the patron/collector who was keen to signal ownership of his or her recent acquisition and appropriate it as a sign of wealth and power.

When works of art began to be collected and displayed in galleries and in the homes of collectors, they were customarily reframed into standardised frames as a way of indicating “their attachment to a particular collection and to signify possession”.60 MacLachlan and Reid note that since it was the norm for gilt frames to be added to paintings (which were usually ‘extracompositional’ in that they did not constitute an integral part of the artist’s work) control of the frame and therefore the painting as an “aesthetic object and economic good” was located in the proprietorial hands of the new owner.61

As highlighted by Rosen, we might assume that in certain instances frames act as strategic devices to give visibility to the owners of works of art by calling attention to themselves at the border:

The owner is not invisible, has not been since the sixteenth century when “house style” framing was adopted for private collections. Since then, even, especially in museums, the frame is the device, the agent, that allows the owner/collector, him [sic], to be present, to be visible, as a creator, a creator other and more powerful than the artist, a curator/creator who is framer, author, of a text that can be read apart from the text of the art object, a text, which by circumscribing that of the art object, inscribes its text within a

meta-text, a super-text subsuming that of the art object.62

Needless to say, artists are generally keen to minimise ‘post-production’ framing, especially when they feel it will unnecessarily alter or obscure how their work will be experienced. By taking control of the painting’s margin, as MacLachlan and Reid state, the artist is able “to incorporate the whole field, borders and all, into the composition itself. The frame, while remaining separate from what is depicted, thus becomes

60 Rosen, p. 13. Also see Richard R. Brettell and Steven Starling, The Art of the Edge: European Frames 1300 - 1900 (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1986), pp. 15-17. 61 MacLachlan and Reid, pp. 22-23. 62 Reesa Greenberg, ‘MOMA and Modernism: The frame ’ in Parachute (No. 42, English translation, March-May 1986), p. 22, quoted in Rosen, p. 13. 41

inseparable from the composition as a whole. Unlike the adjunctive or ‘extra- compositional’ frames that belong to the world of the viewer/consumer, these ‘intra- compositional’ frames … resist , remaining under the artistic control of the artist concerned”.63 Rosen had also made this point a few years prior, stating that when a frame is integrated by an artist into an artwork, this may in fact help to make “subsequent appropriation by future owners impossible”.64

Frames can also be specific to the culture of origin, and those that are common in one culture may not be considered politically or aesthetically appropriate to the art works of another. If a gallery were to place an ornate gilt frame around an Australian Aboriginal painting, this would probably be

taken to signify the appropriation of black culture by whites.65

The above quotation hypothesises about the inappropriate placing of an ‘extracompositional’ gilt frame around an Aboriginal painting. However, the fact that many Aboriginal paintings are now painted on Belgium linen stretched over stretcher frames should not be ignored. It is interesting to question, why the adoption of stretcher frames and linen is not similarly seen as a form of appropriation of Aboriginal art by white city dealers intent on repackaging Aboriginal paintings according to dominant Western modes of presentation (ie., stretched canvases on white walls). To answer this by stating that this phenomenon is market driven - collectors feel more comfortable buying works on linen, and that this is evidence of the absorption of Aboriginal art into the globalised art economy - does little to quell the anomaly. One thing, however, that makes the adoption of the traditional Western support more palatable than the addition of the traditional gilt frame is that the latter - or so the above quotation implies - happens after the artist has relinquished control of the work. In other words, the choice of support was a conscious part of artistic production, whereas the (hypothetical) gilt frame occurred ‘post-production’ and was therefore beyond the artist’s control.

Although all ‘post-production’ frames can be assumed to be ‘extracompositional’ (based on the assumption that a frame arising outside of an artist’s authorial control can not be

63 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 24. 64 Rosen, p. 13. 65 MacLachlan and Reid, pp. 23-24. 42

considered part of the artwork), it does not necessarily follow that all artist-controlled frames are ‘intracompositional’.

With regard to painting, Pearson uses ‘composition’ to not only refer to the arrangement of parts within pictorial space but also to the artist’s wider aesthetic vision in relation to that picture. For example, Pearson refers to Georges Seurat’s pointillist abstract borders painted directly onto the canvas [see Figure 12] as “thoroughly intra-compositional”, stating that they form “part of the composition but not part of the picture”.66

Figure 12: Georges Seurat, Le Crotoy, Upstream (1889), oil on canvas, 700 x 860 mm.

It can be observed, however, that Pearson’s notion of ‘composition’ occasionally extends beyond the boundary of what can safely be described as the artwork, especially when he writes about the white wooden frames of Edgar Degas. It is quite clear in Seurat’s instance how his ‘in-built’ borders constitute a continuum in his painterly

66 Pearson, p. 20. Pearson’s use of the word “thoroughly” here indicates his acceptance of degrees of ‘intracompositionality’. 43

aesthetic vision and are worthy of their ‘intracompositional’ accreditation. Similarly, it is clear how frames in artworks such as Jan Toorop’s The Song of the Times (1893) [Figure 13] and Robert Delaunay’s Simultaneous Windows on the City (1912) [Figure 14] - where the painted composition of each extends onto the surface of the frame - can be described as ‘intracompositional’.

Figure 13: Jan Toorop, The Song of the Times (1893), pencil and crayon on board, 320 x 585 mm.

44

Figure 14: Robert Delaunay, Simultaneous Windows on the City (1912), oil on canvas and wood (painted frame), 460 x 400 mm.

However, with Degas’ white frames, which Pearson also cites as ‘intracompositional’, the extent to which these can be described as being part of the composition is open to question; especially when considering that Degas intended these frames to neither add nor detract from his paintings, as gilt frames might, and that he was thus trying to achieve in these frames a degree of ‘neutrality’.

45

Degas was not known as a revolutionary and his choice of white was based on purely aesthetic considerations, namely its luminosity and neutrality, emphasizing the tone of the colours on canvas.67

Isabelle Cahn asserts that there are two convincing explanations for the use of white and coloured frames by Degas and his Impressionist friends: firstly, the influence of the passe-partout used for graphic works, where white and complementary colours were employed to present - but not compete with - the work; and secondly, the colour theories of Michel Eugene Chevreul (1786-1889) who advocated that the colour, gloss and decoration of the frame should not have a detrimental effect on the colour, pattern, shade or light in the painting.68 Therefore, as Cahn states, “the frame colour should be neutral, preferably white, or matching the predominant colours of the painting”, a formula which Degas - along with Camille Pissarro and Mary Cassatt - adhered to.69

It could thus be argued that rather than Degas’ white frames and paintings uniting in compound aesthetic structures (as Pearson argues), Degas’ frames could be considedred to remain distinct from their paintings - the frame simply allowing the pictorial composition to be seen without creating any unnecessary distractions. It therefore seems reasonable to assume that occasionally when artists take control of the frame (and this is equally true today) that rather than attempting to complete the composition, they are in fact attempting to favourably ‘set-off’ the composition. The fact that artists sometimes do this by colonising the area immediately surrounding the artwork does not necessarily mean that the colonised area (ie., the frame or setting) constitutes an integral part of the composition (ie., the artwork).

Degas was instrumental in the paradigmatic shift from gilt frames to white frames. He and Pissarro both exhibited works in white frames at the Independent group exhibition in 1877, and continued to do so throughout the 1880s until white frames became an accepted sign of modernity and regarded by dealers, critics, public and buyers as an appropriate mode of presentation for new and innovative work.

67 Isabelle Cahn, ‘Edgar Degas - Gold or Colour’ in Mendgen, p. 132. 68 See Michel Eugene Chevreul (translation by John Spanton), The Laws of Contrast and Colour and their Application to the Arts (London: G. Routledge & Co., 1857), first printed (Paris: Pitois-Levrault, 1839). 69 Cahn in Mendgen, pp. 131-132. 46

The transitional period however was not seamless. Degas’ use of an inner white ‘cuff’ frame to separate the artwork from an outer gilded frame can be regarded as something of a compromise to his aesthetic vision. The ‘cuff’ frame can be seen on works such as Au Cafe des Ambassadeurs (1885) [Figure 15] - the frame for which Degas is credited with having designed for Count Isaac de Comondo, the artwork’s original owner.70

Figure 15: Edgar Degas, Au Cafe des Ambassadeurs (1885), pastel over etching on buff paper, 265 x 295 mm.

The outer gold frame resembles Degas’ distinctive ‘pipe’ frame - so called because of its shape in profile - with ribbon-and-stave replacing Degas’ more standard flutes on the top outer edge. Moving inwards, the frame drops down to a plain gilded frieze which leads in to the white ‘cuff’. With this solution, as Cahn notes, the gilded frame was able to harmonise with the furniture and other paintings in Count Comondo’s mansion,

70 Despite Degas’ obvious input into this frame, it is often referred to as a ‘Comondo’ frame. 47

whilst the white ‘cuff’ could offer Degas’ artwork a ‘neutral’ break from the surrounding gold.71

Another frame of note in the transition from conventional gilt to modernist white for Impressionist paintings was the ‘decape’ frame developed by Impressionist dealer Paul Durand-Ruel (1831-1922). This frame was essentially a traditional gilt frame with the gold removed to expose the white gesso beneath. Although traces of gold were still present in the pits and crevices of the ornamentation, a translucent colour-wash was often applied to create “a harmonious interplay between the tones of the painting and the frame”.72 With this frame, Durand-Ruel was able to reach something approaching an aesthetic equilibrium: his clients were presumably happy with the familiar form of the frame and the occasional hint of gold, whilst the aesthetic demands of the Impressionist painters for new modes of presentation were, to some extent, respected - or at least taken on board.73

If we leap forward a hundred years, we see that the fight for control of the frame is still being waged. In 1973, dissatisfied with the way museums displayed work, Donald Judd started to buy up aircraft hangars and other former military buildings in Marfa, Texas, in order to create his own idealised exhibition spaces [see Figure 16]. As Putnam notes, Judd was highly critical of museums and resented the fact that a curator could have control over the display of an artist’s work. Putnam continues that Judd “maintained that the only way to ensure that his sculptures were exhibited to his satisfaction was to install them personally”.74 The similarity between Degas and Judd’s predicament, and the decision by both artists to take control of the physical frame as a way of controlling the consumption of their work, is quite apparent.

71 Cahn in Mendgen, p. 137. 72 See Janicki, p. 10. 73 Traber notes a similar tension between Expressionist painters (who favoured simple black frames to intensify the colours within their paintings) and private collectors (who wanted gilt frames to legitimise their acquisitions), in Mendgen, p. 226 and p. 234. 74 Putnam, p. 187. 48

Figure 16: Donald Judd, Untitled, 100 works in mill aluminum (1982-1986), installation view, Chinati Foundation, Marfa, Texas.

The occasional discrepancy in how contemporary commercial galleries list artworks on their room sheets and what is in fact exhibited indicates another point of tension (or aesthetic gap) between artists and those responsible for presenting their work. For example, as part of Michael Lindeman’s solo exhibition missing in action (2004) at Sherman Galleries, Sydney, the artist exhibited ten paintings, New York Ghost #s 11-20 [see Figure 17], which were each propped against the wall at floor level on two bricks. Despite the bricks being quite prominent intra-artistic components of the works, the bricks were omitted from the room sheet, as follows:

New York Ghost #s 11-20 2004 acrylic on canvas 76 x 102 cm each75

75 Sherman Galleries, Michael Lindeman - missing in action (Sydney: Sherman Galleries, list of works, 11 March - 2 April 2004). 49

Although the disappearance of the bricks (obviously ‘missing in action’) might be dismissed as an administrational oversight, it could also - more cynically - be seen as a way of cleansing the work of its unconventional mode of presentation in order to appeal to potential (conservative) buyers.

Figure 17: Michael Lindeman, New York Ghost #s 11 and 12 (2004), acrylic on canvas on bricks, 760 x 1020 mm each canvas.

It may seem overly pedantic to ponder the ‘intracompositionality’ of Lindeman’s bricks, but it is an essential line of questioning if we are to respect the aesthetic vision of the artist with regard to the presentation of his own work. I asked the artist how he saw the bricks as functioning:

IG: During a visit to your studio just before your missing in action exhibition I remember you showing me your New York Ghost series of paintings and we briefly discussed how these might be presented or incorporated into your exhibition. At that stage, I don’t think that you had arrived at the idea of the bricks, so it was a nice surprise to come across the paintings presented in such a way in the exhibition. Could you say a bit about the role of the bricks and how they relate to the paintings?

ML: The New York Ghost series of paintings were presented on common house bricks in an attempt to heighten the transitory state of the bicycles 50

depicted. The paintings are a suspended moment in the continual changing presence of the abandoned bicycles of New York’s sidewalks. I wanted to exhibit the works in a new light, by mounting the paintings on bricks the works became more sculptural, a type of installation of paintings. The bricks were used as props for the disabled bicycles, a way to physically mount the memorials to what was once a functional mode of transport and extend upon the conceptual framework of the paintings.

IG: On the gallery’s ‘list of works’, New York Ghost #s 11-20 were listed as being acrylic on canvas. There was no mention of the bricks. Do you have a comment on this?

ML: An error [on the part of the gallery], or possibly a lack of understanding of the work.76

Having made the case for the need to respect the wishes of artists when it comes to the presentation of their own work, there are occasionally valid reasons for not seeing these wishes through. In 1994 I acquired a small (300 x 640mm) bromide print titled Top Gun (no.2 of 25) by English artist . It came rolled up in a storage box complete with a can of spray-mount and the following detailed instructions:

“TOP GUN” IS A BROMIDE PRINT. IT IS TO BE FIXED DIRECTLY ONTO THE WALL THIS MOUNTING SPRAY ALLOWS FOR REMOVAL AND REMOUNTING HOWEVER, THE PRINT IS DELICATE, SO ALWAYS HANDLE IT WITH CARE BEFORE MOUNTING, LIE THE PRINT FLAT UNTIL IT NO LONGER CURLS ONLY SPRAY THE BACK OF THE PRINT ON RETURNING THE PRINT TO ITS ROLL USE THE ORIGINAL BACKING PAPER IF NECESSARY THE SURFACE OF THE PRINT CAN BE CLEANED USING LIGHTER FUEL

76 Michael Lindeman, personal interview with author, 15 October 2007. 51

For five years the print remained in its box - which from a conservation standpoint is far too long to keep a print rolled up - whilst I considered the pros and cons of framing it according to the artist’s instructions.

In 1999 I flattened out Top Gun and float-hinged it onto a white matboard and placed it in a narrow white box frame with a spacer separating the print from the glazing.

My framing decision was based largely on conservation and ‘reversibility’ considerations. I was not convinced that spray-mounting a print directly onto a wall for a prolonged period was sound conservation practice (without glazing the print would be directly exposed to harmful UV rays, dust and other external elements, and I was concerned that spray-mount would damage the print). I was also unconvinced by the ease with which it was claimed that spray-mount allows for the removal and remounting of the print, and unconvinced that spray-mount would be effective in holding the print flush to the wall for a sufficient period.

So although I framed Top Gun, favoring a conservation ideology over the artist’s own aesthetic vision (and therefore reaffirming the print as something worth preserving and, by implication, as an economic good), it was not without first weighing up the extent to which the instructed mode of presentation contributed to the content of the work. The dilemma being: was the mounting of the bromide print directly to the wall sufficiently ‘intrinsic’ to the content of the work to warrant it playing a part in the print’s long-term damage? By choosing a fully reversible treatment for the print, my decision to frame Top Gun can always be reassessed in the future.

Breaking Out of the Independent Frame. The role of the independent picture frame as a ‘container’ was challenged most markedly by modern art and a move in painting away from perspective and mimesis towards abstraction and anti-illusionism. Where the frame once functioned simply and coherently by leading the viewer’s eye into another world, now the frame started to look out of place, incoherent and awkward. Through the rejection of illusionary depth, painting started to assert its flatness and its materials, and as painting started to question containment and the limiting edge of the canvas, the physical independent frame became problematic. 52

The end of mimesis and the advent of new techniques completely changed the context for both the concept and function of the frame. Since the Renaissance (at the latest) its task had been to divorce the world of the painting from the factual reality surrounding it. The frame was a kind of ‘spacial repoussoir’ that led the eye into the depth, and by virtue of its own three-dimensionality, increased the feeling of space within the picture. The materiality of the work was denied; the frame was a mediator between empirical and imagined actuality.77

Schapiro painted a similar picture, stating that the frame “was dispensable when painting ceased to represent deep space”.78 Over the course of modernism, the frame addressed this attack by continually slimming down and becoming less visible. To use sound as a metaphor: where the gilded Rococo frame had its volume fully turned up, the modern frame vastly reduced the noise level, delivering an ambient soundtrack entirely in keeping (but never competing) with its surroundings.

Prior to the modern artwork’s shift from an inward aesthetic to an outward aesthetic, pressure within the independent picture frame was already building. Brian O’Doherty notes that even with traditional landscape painting, stress was being exerted on the frame by the horizon; and sporadically through the nineteenth century, “atmosphere and ” were beginning to “eat away” at perspective. O’Doherty adds, “Once you know that a patch of landscape represents a decision to exclude everything around it, you are faintly aware of the space outside the picture”.79 Not that this acknowledgment of cropping should necessarily undermine the frame, rather, it also serves to bolster the frame by highlighting the artistic agency of inclusion and exclusion. Nevertheless, questions relating to containment and lateral extension no doubt grew out of these basic realisations.

77 Traber in Mendgen, p. 222 and 226. 78 Schapiro, p. 227. 79 Brian O’Doherty, Inside the White Cube (San Francisco: The Lapis Press, 1986), p. 19. 53

Pablo Picasso’s Still Life with Chair Caning (1912) [Figure 18], which is often credited as being the first collage in the history of art, radically emphasised the material nature of the work of art.80 The incorporation of cheap mariner’s rope around the edge of this work tackled questions relating to both the limiting edge of the frame and illusion head on. Was it a rope, a frame, or the decorative edging of the depicted table top? The crudeness of the rope edging makes it clear that our eagerness to succumb to illusionism is being parodied. Still Life with Chair Caning treads a meandering path between two- and three-dimensions whilst questioning the traditional function of the frame as a device to demarcate inside from outside. The rope frame, as Traber notes, is no longer capable of serving as an authoritative border “between a clearly defined ‘real world’ and an equally unmistakable ‘art(ificial) world’”.81 With this work, Picasso very slightly extends the picture into the viewer’s physical space, mixing real space with the space of the picture. As O’Doherty points out, “If the picture plane defined the wall, collage defines the space between the walls”.82

Figure 18: Pablo Picasso, Still Life with Chair Caning (1912), oil and oilcloth on canvas, with rope frame, 270 x 350 mm.

80 See Traber in Mendgen, p. 234. 81 Ibid., p. 234. 82 O’Doherty (1986), p. 39. 54

As a way of defying depth, the Cubists often used an ‘en fuite’ frame (a bolection profile or reverse-bevel frame) which made their canvases project forward rather than recede. In effect, this pushed the canvas away from the wall towards the viewer, reversing perspective and negating the feeling of depth.83

With the emergence of what Guillaume Apollinaire christened ‘Orphic Cubism’ in 1912 and the appearance of a more fully-blown abstract art from about 1915 onwards, pressure within the frame continued to build. It was not long before the frame as diplomatic mediator became, according to Traber, obsolete: from now on, she asserts, “paintings spoke for themselves, created their own facts, and determined the framework for their own appearances”.84 Although broadly speaking this is true with regard to the independent picture frame, such a statement starts to lose credibility when considering the mediating role(s) played by ‘extended’ frames. To claim that paintings started to ‘speak’ for themselves upon the rejection of ‘loud’ picture frames ignores the fact that framing occurs on many levels and that the resulting frames function in unison to mediate or ‘speak’ on the behalf of exhibited artworks. It would also be wrong to assume that the trend away from figurative painting created some kind of ‘GAME OVER’ situation for the independent frame. Even today the ‘attached’ frame continues to play a significant part in the presentation of art. This is very apparent when viewing ‘works on paper’ and photography, but also - to a lesser extent perhaps - when looking at painting.85 It would also be wrong to assume that questions surrounding the edge of painting have all been answered and buried in the twentieth century. In 2001 at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, Douglas Fogle curated an exhibition titled Painting at the Edge of the World which asked quite literally: “Where does the edge of the canvas end and the edge of the world begin?”86 And this show was by no means unique or out- of-step with contemporary thought. What Fogle’s exhibition inadvertently highlighted was the disparity between the urgency to conceptually reconfigure painting at the turn of the century, and the lack of a corresponding effort to reconfigure the (‘immediate’ and ‘extended’) physical frame. Had such a reconfiguration occurred, statements such

83 Traber in Mendgen, p. 235. 84 Ibid., p. 240. 85 Although ‘works on paper’ are sometimes exhibited pinned directly to the wall, it is more common to see them presented behind glass/Perspex in box frames. 86 See the exhibition’s accompanying publication, Douglas Fogle (ed), Painting at the Edge of the World (Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2001), p. 15. 55

as “the frame has become obsolete” or “the contemporary artwork is frameless” would at least need to be substantiated by stating the type of frame to which one is referring.

Some of the most radical formal changes to the independent frame can be found in the practice of Piet Mondrian (1872-1944), a painter obsessed with how his paintings fitted into the surrounding world.

So far as I know, I was the first to bring the painting forward from the frame, rather than set it within the frame. I had noted that a picture without a frame works better than a framed one, and that the framing causes sensations of three dimensions. It gives an illusion of depth, so I took a frame of plain wood and mounted my picture on it. In this way I brought it to a more real existence... To move the painting into our surroundings and give it real existence has been my ideal since I came to abstract painting.87

Characteristic of Mondrian’s paintings is the “rejection of the idea of a centre in the composition”, and the suggestion that the pictorial structure extends beyond the edge of “the canvas or frame … into the surrounding space”.88 Consistent with this sense of ‘uncontainability’, if there is more than one Mondrian painting present within a single environment, it is difficult not to relate each of these unitary paintings to one another; and further, to consider how they fit into and relate to the wider environment as a whole. This is especially noticeable in the photographs of Mondrian’s studio at 26, rue du Départ, Paris, 1926, in which a number of precision-placed Mondrian paintings inter- relate with each other and contribute to the overall composition of the room [Figure 19]. As Mondrian’s reductive strategy demonstrates, the removal of one problematic frame from the equation (ie., the independent picture frame) does not eliminate the possibility of it being superceded by a more transient, discursive and unpredictable physical context or setting - which thus makes the process of framing infinitely more complex and rich in potential.

87 Piet Mondrian, ‘Eleven Europeans in America’ in The MoMA Bulletin 13 (No. 45, 1943), pp. 35-36, quoted in Bailey, p. 106. 88 Traber in Mendgen, p. 246. 56

Figure 19: Piet Mondrian’s studio at 26, rue du Départ, Paris, 1926.

Mondrian’s contribution to framing is perhaps ironic bearing in mind that his position on framing is often considered to be ‘anti-frame’. But the significance and influence of his ground-breaking (some may say ‘frame-breaking’) work is still evident today. The development of Mondrian’s side strips and receding side strips (which he used from 1914) and his ‘set-back’ frames (used from 1916) have been instrumental in shaping contemporary framing tastes and the way that artists approach the dynamic between ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ physical frames.

Side strips of varying descriptions and serving various purposes are now prevalent and can be found on countless modern and contemporary paintings, although at first glance many of these paintings may appear to be ‘unframed’.89 And Mondrian’s ‘set-back’ frame (or ‘sub-frame’ as it is sometimes referred) is undoubtedly the most obvious pointer towards the later dropping of the independent frame completely.90 However, as Mitchell and Roberts note with regard to the ‘wall-like’ setting applied to Roberto Melli’s Composizione (1918/9) [Figure 20] - which is similar in form to Mondrian’s ‘set-back’ frame - the problem of morphing the frame into a secondary wall is that

89 For example, Jackson Pollock’s Blue Poles, Number 11 (1952) has a narrow but deceptively deep side strip frame which conceals a supportive metal sub-frame designed to give the stretched canvas increased protection and structural integrity during its display and especially during transportation. It should be noted that this is a ‘post-production’ frame, but it is not incongruous with the painting. 90 Although Picasso’s portrait of Gertrude Stein was purposely left ‘unframed’ from 1906 until 1908 (see Traber in Mendgen, p. 221) this can be seen as a pre-emptive blip in comparison to Mondrian’s more sustained and resolved framing position. 57

“unless it was extended impossibly far in all directions, the eye would inevitably be circumscribed by its edges” and traditional interiority-exteriority distinctions would start to arise once again.91

Figure 20: Roberto Melli, Composizione (1918/9), oil on canvas, 400 x 600 mm.

Rigid interior-exterior distinctions were further dissolved as art progressed. In 1958 Leo Castelli Gallery in New York exhibited Jasper Johns’ target and flag paintings and Robert Rauschenberg’s ‘combines’. In different ways, both Johns’ object-paintings and Rauschenberg’s paintings incorporating objects contributed to the artwork’s invasion of the viewer’s space. These works marked a shift in the way painting was now to be seen: less as an enclosed two-dimensional surface and more as an object in space. Frank Stella’s shaped canvases shown at the same gallery a few years later reiterated this shift.

Also contributing to the early 1960s investigation into the objectness of painting was Richard Artschwager who furnished spaces with domestic-looking ‘pictorial sculptures’ and ‘dimensional paintings’. By creating veneered forms based on chairs, tables, framed

91 Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, pp. 408-409. 58

mirrors etc. in real space, Artschwager was able to construct ambiguous furniture- surrogates that mixed fact with illusion [see Figure 21]. Richard Armstrong notes that Artschwager’s use of printed formica on some of his fabricated objects was a particularly successful way of integrating object and image.92

Figure 21: Richard Artschwager, Mirror (1964), and Chair/Chair (1965), formica on wood, 1549 x 1092 x 102 mm, and 1070 x 1070 x 4250 mm.

92 Richard Armstrong, Artschwager, Richard (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1988), p. 17. 59

During the mid 1960s Artschwager made a number of formica frame-objects which seemed to make explicit his interest in the relationship between art, the ‘immediate’ frame, and the surrounding space [see Figure 22]. The scale and proportions of these frame-objects produced “widely varying results, from obvious picture-surrogates to puzzling geometrically concave objects, where the image is subsumed within sculptural reality”.93

Figure 22: Richard Artschwager, Untitled (1966), formica on wood, 1219 x 828 x 305 mm.

Balancing the sculptural art-furniture side of Artschwager’s practice were his paintings which consciously incorporated their physical frames as sculptural elements.

In 1965, Artschwager had begun to use commercially manufactured, grooved metal frames on his paintings. Their shiny, reflective surfaces at once announced the material independence of the enclosed paintings from their surrounds, and, paradoxically, served to mirror and hence integrate the static images into their fluctuating environments. Viewers see themselves reacting in motion to the picture as well as to the constantly shifting quality of the ambient light. These frames, used by Artschwager for the next twenty

93 Ibid., p. 20. 60

years, literalize the obdurate formica mirrors and beveled formica frames of his earlier work.94

As Artschwager’s mirrored frames adequately convey, the surrounding space of the late modernist artwork had become an essential ingredient. This was certainly true with Agnes Martin’s paintings, which encouraged an outward appreciation of space, incorporating surrounding light and the way in which it interacts with the painted surface, as well as an implied boundlessness of image. In such a case, a heavy independent frame would be conceptually at odds with the work. However, it should be remembered that even when paintings are left ‘unframed’ the vast majority are still concealing a stretcher frame under the canvas. And as Frank Stella, Ellsworth Kelly and, later, Sean Scully have demonstrated, this ‘hidden’ frame is by no means invisible. Nor for that matter, should it necessarily imply boundlessness, because the ‘hidden’ stretcher frame still acts as a material reinforcement of the edge of the painting.

The history outlined above throws up one obvious inconsistency. It presents the independent frame as dispensable once painting ceased to represent deep space, but does little to explain why a plethora of contemporary painters who continue to incorporate illusion and depth in their paintings also tend to steer away from ‘heavy’ independent picture frames. In fact contemporary framing styles for abstract and representational paintings differ very little. This is a complex issue with numerous explanations, but a comprehensive rationale for the ‘dispensability’ of the independent frame in contemporary non-abstract painting would have to include the following points: the perceived increase in the visual literacy of the contemporary viewer and their ability to decipher images (and what constitutes the edge of an image) without the direct mediation of an ‘attached’ frame; the artist’s increased responsibility for the ‘extended’ setting reducing the need for a portable ‘immediate’ frame; an acknowledgment of the gallery and wall (usually white) as readymade frames or passe-partout; and the negative connotations of the independent frame as a sign of things past.

Scale is also a factor. With the increase in size of paintings post Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock et al. there has been a reduced need for a focusing device to tune the viewer in to the work. As Allan Kaprow points out, it is as if these enormous canvases “ceased to

94 Ibid., p. 29. 61

become paintings and became environments”, thus engulfing the viewer and appearing boundless.95 With such vast canvases, the independent frame (if one exists at all) is relegated to peripheral vision. The space of the painting becomes the viewer’s space, and reciprocally, the viewer’s space becomes implicated in the painting.

The activation of the space around an artwork is more than implied with Dan Flavin’s A Primary Structure (1964) [Figure 23]. This consists of a wall-based rectangle of fluorescent tubes in red, yellow and blue. Where Picasso’s collages, Rothko’s ‘colour- field’ paintings, and Rauschenberg’s ‘combines’ activated the space in front of the artwork predominantly through implication, Flavin’s fluorescent lights gave us a more ‘active’ or heightened invasion of real space. The tubes illuminate the area within and surrounding the rectangle frame, giving a timely representation of the inside-outside breakdown of the modern artwork.

Figure 23: Dan Flavin, A Primary Structure (1964), fluorescent light, 720 x 1220 x 75 mm (lighting hardware).

95 Allan Kaprow, Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life / Allan Kaprow (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 2003), p. 6. 62

From Isolated Artwork to Discursive Context.

By exposing the effect of context on art, of the container on the contained, Duchamp recognised an area of art that hadn’t yet been invented... From this moment on, there is a seepage of energy from art to its surroundings.96

Although the outward momentum of the isolated artwork to a macro position beyond the viewer could be said to have begun in the second half of the nineteenth century with the questioning of the independent picture frame and what lay beyond it,97 it was not until the twentieth century that the seepage from the artwork to its surroundings - through a metaphorical crack in the conventional picture frame - became less of a trickle and more of a flow.

As art embraced its surrounds and the ‘invention’ of context, the independent frame - so as not to get in the way - retracted, slimmed down, and at one stage looked to have dematerialised completely (with the arrival of Conceptual Art the independent frame looked to be obsolete until framed texts started to appear in galleries).98 Running concurrent with the slimming down of the independent frame was the evolution of the museum/gallery and the resultant ‘white cube’, which still undeniably has a dominant presence in the exhibition of contemporary art today.99 With reduced attention on the

96 O’Doherty (1986), p. 65. 97 A notable example being Camille Pissarro who in 1880 at L’Exposition des Independants exhibited works in purple frames with yellow mounts in a lilac room with canary yellow borders; see Mitchell and Roberts, Frameworks, p. 459, footnote 29. This exhibition design was recorded by Joris-Karl Huysmans in ‘L’ Exposition des Independants en 1880’ in L’ Art Moderne (Paris: Charpentier, 1883, 1969 edition), p. 91. 98 On another level, the Conceptual Art dealer/curator, Seth Siegelaub, referred to magazine articles, interviews, reviews etc. as “outside information”, which can be seen as forming part of a broader ‘circumtextual’ frame. For an account of how Siegelaub employed publicity to frame conceptual artworks see Alexander Alberro’s Conceptual Art and the Politics of Publicity (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003). 99 Although there are discussions as to whether we are still within the grips of the ‘white cube’: a panel discussion titled Spaces for Containing Art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, in March 2005 asked exactly that. However, despite the much heralded bankrupt ideology of the ‘white cube’, it appears unlikely that white gallery spaces will disappear any time soon. For elaboration on this argument, see Elena Filipovic, ‘The Global White Cube’ in Barbara Vanderlinden and Elena Filipovic (eds), The Manifesta Decade: debates on contemporary art exhibitions and biennials in post-wall Europe (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2005), pp. 63-84. 63

‘immediate’ frame, the ‘institutional’ frame came into sharper focus, aided by a steady stream of artists keen to shift attention away from the artwork towards the context within which the artwork was to be encountered.

With art having pushed out beyond the conventional frame into the gallery (and sometimes beyond that), installation art came into existence, becoming more sophisticated and prevalent as the twenty-first century approached, making the move from isolated art object to discursive context complete.

Extending the Notion of an ‘Immediate’ Frame. The physical frame that is left in the middle, as it were, after the inward and outward expansion of the frame (ie., the frame that has not been absorbed into the artwork or been thrust into the surrounds) has itself experienced a period of reinvention and redefinition. This reappraisal has also contributed to an extended notion of what it is to frame something and what constitutes a frame.

Below, I elaborate on how the mounting of digital and photographic prints on to substrates such as aluminium and Perspex, the pinning of artworks directly to gallery walls, and the use of propping supports and shelves have become aligned with the term “framing” (often being used interchangeably with it), even though no permanently attached physical frame (in a traditional sense) or enclosing structure appears to be present.

Mounting. Within any major collection or assembly of contemporary art you could probably expect to find at least one or two examples of photographic or digital prints (usually face-mounted behind Perspex and/or back-mounted onto aluminium). This would be equally true for an international art biennale as it would a student degree show. The relatively recent introduction of these ‘mega-prints’ into the fine art arena required a radical rethinking of traditional mounting and framing methods. Often too

64

large, glossy and contemporary in feel to deem ‘Japanese hinging’100 and rag matting as either appropriate or desirable, the solution seemed to lie nearer to contemporary commercial or graphic art mounting than to traditional fine art mounting.101 An increase in awareness of conservation issues as well as technical developments in the types of adhesives, substrates, and laminates used in dry and pressure-sensitive mounting meant that these large and often valuable prints could be mounted in a sufficiently archival manner, which would also overcome the potential technical problems such as billowing or ‘cockling’ of the print which might occur with traditional hinging methods. As a result of this paradigm change, many framing studios now have the equipment and expertise to mount photographic and digital prints on-site, and mounting is very much thought of as an intrinsic part of a contemporary framer’s responsibility.

From a non-technical perspective, the mounting process literally solidifies the activity of cropping and makes the field of the work clear, permanent and tangible. It articulates the image field or area of interest in a more definitive way than a work which is not mounted.

What a mounted photograph presents us with is a physical frame in which the material border or edge has receded out of view from the front of the artwork to its sides, where only a hairline border remains visible, never all at once, and rarely acknowledged. The resulting visual effect of an ‘unframed’ mounted photograph is of an image floating in space, hovering in a white void, which is often enhanced by the mounted photograph sitting slightly off the wall on a sub-frame or bracket.

100 ‘Japanese hinging’ (also referred to as ‘museum hinging’) is a traditional method of securing fine artworks in place using rice/wheat starch and Japanese/Mulberry paper. It is still the method of choice for most conservation framers today. For a detailed and comprehensive look at traditional and current conservation methods see Joanna M. Kosek’s Conservation Mounting for Prints and Drawings (London: Archetype Publications, 2004). Also see Vivian Kistler’s Library of Professional Picture Framing, Volume 4: Conservation Framing (Ohio: Columbia Publishing, 1997). 101 The term ‘mounting’ is also used in the framing industry to describe hinging, although in this thesis I distinguish between the two as follows: mounting = the direct gluing of something/an artwork in its entirety to a substrate; and hinging = the fixing of an artwork to a surface using discrete paper hinges, tape, and/or supporting corners. 65

Pinning. One of the more mundane functions of a frame is to enable an artwork to be fixed to a wall so that it can be viewed at a reasonable height. For this reason, the fixings and fasteners used to secure an artwork to a wall (D-rings and picture wire on the reverse of a traditional frame, or pins and tape without the presence of a material frame) are inextricably linked to framing.

The work of Robert Ryman gives us an explicit view of how fixings and fastenings can play an elevated and crucial role in creating a direct, visible transition between a painting and a wall in a way that echoes the mediating function of a more traditional frame.102 In this respect, it is possible to talk about pins, bolts, clips, even Blu-Tac, as comparable to physical frames - at least as material manifestations of the framing act, and as mediators in their own right.

Another way of looking at the pinning and taping of artworks directly to gallery walls is as a contemporary version of hinging. Rather than the artwork being hinged on to a ‘neutral’ mount-board, the artwork is ‘hinged’ directly to the gallery wall. This reaffirms the notion of the gallery as a large physical frame or immersive passe-partout.

Propping (propping supports and shelves). Another mode of presentation which violates the traditional notion of a physical frame as an impenetrable enclosure, but that could still be referred to as a frame in an expanded sense - especially when considering that pedestals and plinths are often regarded as sculpture’s equivalent to a frame - is the use of propping supports (or propping ‘pedestals’) and shelves. I am talking specifically here about propping examples where something extra has been introduced to an artwork and its presentation rather than where an artwork has been propped against a wall without any extra ingredient: as with Michael Lindeman’s New York Series #s 11-20 (2004) for example, discussed earlier in this chapter, where the paintings were propped against the wall on brick supports. Here a very definite act of framing had occurred, with the bricks forming an ‘immediate’ physical frame (the first sign-bearing matter that the eye comes to beyond the paintings themselves).

102 See Simon Wilson, Robert Ryman (London: Tate Gallery, exhibition brochure, 17 February - 25 April 1993), unpaginated. 66

It is understandable how mounting, pinning and propping have become inseparable from the notion of framing. Not only could it be argued that they directly descend from traditional framing practices (mounting from hinging, pinning from either frame fixings and/or from hinging, and propping supports from pedestals) they all also involve a decision on the part of artists regarding how their work should best be presented within the space in which their work is to be shown. They therefore constitute very definite acts of framing.

The ‘Implied’ Frame. Although there are numerous reasons why an artist might choose to pin or tape an artwork directly to a wall, or prop it against a wall, the absence of a more traditionally attached physical frame does seem to imply, even dictate, that the supporting wall should be white, thus creating a non-competing setting for the work. Christoph Grunenberg in Contemporary Cultures of Display acknowledges that white is “the preferred background for the presentation of contemporary art”, claiming that much of twentieth-century art “has been produced with the clean spaces and white walls of modern museums and galleries in mind”.103 Martha Buskirk also notes that “for contemporary art the museum or gallery space now dominates as the presumed context”.104 So although pins and tape may not be frames in a pure and literal sense, when used in contemporary art, these modes of presentation can in fact imply a physical setting or border: a wall, usually in a gallery, and preferably white. This could be referred to as an ‘implied’ frame or context.

The Evolution and Function of the Gallery.

The most dramatic and catalytic event in the invention of the museum in its modern form was the French Revolution. As a direct result of the revolution there came about the opening up and reformatting of the formerly royal and princely collections. While the principal venue of these changes was of course the Louvre, a number of new museum sites around Paris pioneered

103 Christoph Grunenberg, ‘The Modern Art Museum’ in Emma Barker (ed), Contemporary Cultures of Display (Yale University Press in Association with Open University, 1999), p. 26. O’Doherty had earlier made this observation in his seminal text Inside the White Cube. 104 Martha Buskirk, The Contingent Object of Contemporary Art (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003), p. 10. 67

new stagecraft techniques. Some techniques had earlier precedents. The notion of the gallery had its origins (and its name) in the long corridors common to royal houses and châteaus [sic], within which were typically arranged sequentially chronological family portraits.105

The contemporary art museum/gallery in its various formats evolved out of a desire to collect and display things of significance and interest. By tracing this desire back (prior to the French Revolution, which evidently accelerated the democratisation of art and the development of the public museum) it is possible to forge a link between the museum/gallery and the sixteenth and seventeenth-century European ‘cabinet of curiosity’ or ‘Wunderkammer’ [see Figure 24].106

Figure 24: A sixteenth/seventeenth-century Wunderkammer.

105 Donald Preziosi, ‘Brain of the Earth’s Body: Museums and the Framing of Modernity’ in Duro, p. 100. 106 It is interesting to note here that, with regard to collection and display, Richard Deacon has pointed out that within Sir Charles Leonard Wooley’s account of the excavation at Ur (biblical home of Abraham) there is evidence of collection, conservation, and display in perhaps the oldest city in the world. See Richard Deacon and Philip Lindley, Image and Idol: Medieval Sculpture (London: Tate, 2001), pp. 9-10; and Charles Leonard Wooley, Ur of the Chaldees (Melbourne: Penguin Press, 1954), first published in 1929. 68

The Wunderkammer was a very private and devotional place specially created with the profound belief that nature was linked with art. The collections were usually displayed in multi-compartmented cabinets and vitrines and arranged in such a way as to inspire wonder and stimulate creative thought. They included exotic natural objects that crossed the rational boundaries of animal, vegetable and mineral, such as fossils, coral formations and composite creatures, basilisks and mermen. Particularly desirable were anomalies or freaks of nature and optical wonders like special mirrors and lenses capable of distorting reality.107

From these amazingly layered environments with their dense and over-lapping display methods, begun a gradual move away from excess towards a more reductive aesthetic. This eventually culminated - via the Salon - with the creation of the ultra-reductive modernist ‘white cube’.

In his introduction to Brian O’Doherty’s Inside the White Cube, Thomas McEvilley suggests that the roots of the ‘white cube’ can be legitimately traced back to the Egyptian tomb chambers and the Palaeolithic painted caves of the Magdalenian and Aurignacian ages in France and Spain.108 This historical linkage is based on the observation that these ancient ritual spaces were designed, like the ‘white cube’, to “eliminate awareness of the outside world” thus evoking a sense of timelessness and eternity. This supports O’Doherty’s own portrayal of the ‘white cube’ as a quasi- religious space and is a reasonably plausible analogy, even if the religious aura, purity, and rhetoric of eternity once associated with the ‘white cube’ has somewhat diminished in recent years.109 This perceptual (rather than formal) change to the ‘white cube’ is not visually evident - not like the paradigmatic shift from Salon to ‘white cube’ - but it is a significant change all the same, especially with regard to the way the ‘white cube’ functions. Because if the gallery is being perceived in a different way, this will have a knock-on effect for the artworks it contains. If the aura of the ‘white cube’ is starting to wane, its ability to elevate artworks may also be on the decline.

107 Putnam, p.10. 108 In O’Doherty (1986), p. 8 (Introduction by Thomas McEvilley). 109 To quote Art and Language: "Anyway, the ascetic aura of the white cube has all but disappeared, residing only in the nostalgia of old bullshitters" (from the press-release for the exhibition White3 at Gallerie Poo-Poo, London, 30 October - 22 November 1998). 69

Despite contemporary art’s ongoing habit of displaying artworks within the context of the ‘white cube’, there is undoubtedly potential for the gallery to physically mutate once again into something altogether new. As Grunenberg points out, “Radical innovations in museum display have generally evolved out of developments in art itself”. This has been apparent throughout the twentieth century, with artists demanding and obtaining “environments that reflected the principles embodied in their work”.110 O’Doherty points out however that this process is usually “delayed”, noting that in their first exhibition in 1874 the Impressionists installed their pictures “cheek by jowl, just as they would have hung in the Salon”.111

The Salon-style hangs which proliferated throughout the nineteenth century were characterised by a wallpaper effect with paintings hung in close proximity, floor to ceiling, separated by heavy gilt frames with barely a slither of wall between them [see Figure 25]. Rather than absorbing the overall environment (as was partially the case with the ‘Wunderkammer’), with the Salon, the viewer was required to ‘tune-in’ to each work individually. Until the late nineteenth century, the authority of the frame as a ‘parergonal’ marker of limits - and what happened beyond the frame - went largely unquestioned.

... the stability of the frame is as necessary as an oxygen tank is to a diver. Its limiting security completely defines the experience within... The classic package of perspective enclosed by the Beaux-Arts frame makes it possible for pictures to hang like sardines. There is no suggestion that the space within the picture is continuous with the space on either side of it.112

110 Grunenberg in Barker, p. 28. 111 O’Doherty (1986), p. 24. 112 Ibid., pp. 18-19. 70

Figure 25: Jean Berard, A Day in the Salon (1874), oil on canvas, 1000 x 810 mm.

It was not long, however, before the changes that painting was going through during the early twentieth century started to impact on the wider setting beyond the frame. The aesthetics of the ‘hang’ started to take on a new significance with artists becoming more conscious of how much space surrounded their work. Not surprisingly, the densely packed Salon-style ‘hang’ was soon regarded as inappropriate and outdated. O’Doherty amusingly stated that it was impossible for the modern painter to put on an exhibition without first surveying the exhibition space “like a health inspector”.113

Although the (MoMA) in New York which opened in 1929 is often credited with being the first museum to establish the ‘white cube’ as an international standard114 it did however have its precedents:

113 Ibid., p. 29. 114 See Grunenberg in Barker, p. 26. 71

In 1926, a group of modern paintings entered the collection of The Art Institute of Chicago and were installed in a single gallery designed by the donor, Frederick Clay Bartlett. All the paintings in the Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection were chosen by Bartlett and his wife, and their ideas about the display of works of modern art extended to matters of framing. Bartlett had his gallery in the Art Institute painted white and paintings placed in off-white, simple moldings of a consistent design.115

Early manifestations of modernist display could be found in European museums and exhibitions after World War I, which - as Grunenberg notes - Alfred H Barr (MoMA’s first director) would have no doubt been aware of, encountered, adapted and refined.116

In 1915 Kasimir Malevich exhibited a number of purely abstract Suprematist paintings in the 0.10 exhibition in Saint Petersburg [Figure 26]. This exhibition is particularly remarkable for the strategic hanging of his black square painting which was placed high up in a corner of the room traversing two walls. What is apparent from this exhibition, with its relatively minimal physical setting and interplay between works, is how abstract painting was beginning to dictate a new kind of exhibition space and viewer experience.

115 Brettell and Starling, p. 19. 116 Grunenberg in Barker, p. 30. For an excellent account of the evolving exhibition spaces and display strategies to influence El Lissitzky’s Proun Room (1923) - and beyond - see Eva Forgacs, ‘Definitive Space: The Many Utopias of El Lissitzky’s Proun Room’ in Nancy Perloff and Brian Reed (eds), Situating El Lissitzky: Vitebsk, Berlin, Moscow (Los Angeles: Getty Publications, 2003), pp. 47-75. In the same publication there is a description and image of Heinrich Tessonow’s ground-breaking gallery interior design for the Internationale Kunstausstellung, Dresden, in 1926, see Maria Gough’s ‘Constructivism Disorientated: El Lissitzky’s Dresden and Hannover Demonstrationraume’, pp. 85- 86. 72

Figure 26: Kasimir Malevich, The Last Futurist Exhibition of Pictures 0.10 (Zero.Ten) (1915), installation view, St Petersburg.

According to Grunenberg, the ‘white cube’ can also be traced back to the “austere, simple laboratory spaces” of abstract artists’ studios.117 Mondrian’s studio for example (as photographed in 1926) [see Figure 19] bares testament to this theory. This type of ‘behind-the-scenes’ access to artist-controlled studio environments can, on occasion, give a rare glimpse into the ‘delayed’ period to which O’Doherty previously referred.118

Alongside these mainstream histories of the ‘white cube’ and its origin, I would like to offer another explanation which complements rather than nullifies all of the above. This being, that the evolution of the ‘white cube’ was greatly assisted by Chevreul’s colour theories and the white frames of Degas and his peers, as these first suggested (and then ingrained) white as the preferred setting for art. In this respect, the ‘white cube’ can be

117 Grunenberg in Barker, p. 28. 118 Also see O’Doherty’s recent publication Studio and Cube - On the relationship between where art is made and where art is displayed (New York: Buell Center, 2007) which argues that pristine studio spaces played their part in the rise of the white-walled gallery space. 73

regarded as the ultimate manifestation of Degas’ white ‘cuff’ frame, liberated from its restraining gilt frame.

Comparisons between the ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ physical frame are however not new. In fact the function of the traditional independent frame and the modern art gallery are quite obvious.

I want to suggest that museums and art galleries operate in ways very similar to framing devices, alerting us to the fact that we are in a physical environment in which we are likely to see Art objects. This sets in train a very complex set of attitudes, assumptions, and behaviours which are thought to be appropriate to the viewing of such objects. One of the reasons for the decline in framing devices for individual works may be that the building in which the objects are housed has itself taken on that role.119

Although tentatively put, Carter’s hypothesis is difficult to dispute. The museum/gallery does indeed function in ways very similar to a framing device, because the museum/gallery is in fact an ‘extended’ frame. It functions like a readymade frame: created in response to artworks which may as yet be undefined or unrealised, but which is designed nonetheless to house those artworks within a specific predefined boundary. And like a traditional picture frame, it acts as an isolating device, a focusing device, a regulating device, and a device for negotiating physical and conceptual space.

Due to these similarities - particularly the isolating function - the art museum/gallery has undergone a similar critique to that of the traditional picture frame. In fact, much neo-avant-garde debate surrounding the museum/gallery and its tendency to segregate art from its context of production, rhetoricising artworks as autonomous objects, is pertinent to the independent picture frame and its own history. In other words, the lateral extension of painting and so-called breaking of the independent frame in the first half of the twentieth century can be seen as a dress-rehearsal for the intense critique of the museum/gallery which started gaining momentum in the second half of the twentieth century.

119 Carter, pp. 165-166. 74

The breaking of the museum/gallery as a definitive container was the result of (and resulted in) a range of artworks and activities occurring beyond the confines of institutional walls - Land Art and ‘site works’ produced in the late 1960s and 1970s by artists such as Robert Smithson, Michael Heizer, Walter De Maria and Richard Long are examples of this development. But pressure on the gallery as a segregating device was felt from many quarters: Guy Debord and other members of the Situationist International (1957-1972) called for the decommodification of art and the dissolution of art into lived experience; and in his essay ‘Comments on the Second Frame’ (1977) Joseph Kosuth discussed some of the ‘problems’ with showing in galleries, calling for a less isolated form of art.120 Paul Ardenne comments on this move beyond the gallery as follows:

Modern art, of course, was painstaking in creating its sites, its own place: in conferring on itself its form, its rules, its manifestoes and museums. The art of the endmost part of the century, on the other hand, has taken over real space again in a perspective of dissolution, infusion and insemination, as if art no longer had its own place, and in the end had elected reality to be its natural place of growth.121

Whereas the independent picture frame countered the attack on itself by slimming down and becoming less prominent, the museum/gallery countered the attack on itself by adopting a more open-door policy, promoting ‘art for all’, and being more responsive and inclusive of local community; thus accepting its double-edged function (like the traditional picture frame) to not only isolate and elevate, but to also connect and bind.

With such a sustained critique, it is ironic that the art museum/gallery’s institutional authority and ability to miraculously elevate everything it contains has been undermined not so much by its detractors but rather, quite bizarrely, by its own success:

120 Joseph Kosuth, ‘Comments on the Second Frame’ (1977) in Gabriele Guercio (ed), Joseph Kosuth, Art After Philosophy and After: Collected Writings, 1966-90 (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1991), pp. 169-173. 121 Paul Ardenne (translated by Stephen Wright), ‘Experimenting with the Real: Art and Reality at the End of the Twentieth Century’ in Paul Ardenne, Pascal Beausse, and Laurent Goumarre, Contemporary Practices: Art as Experience (Paris: Dis Voir, 1999), pp. 38-39. In Chapter 2 of this thesis, I discuss how such non-gallery-bound artworks are framed, but for the moment I will concentrate on the framing function of the museum/gallery and artworks contained within. 75

Today, I’m very amused by the fact that through its proliferation the institution destroyed itself in a way that none of us could have imagined, and now we are confronted with its incredible weakness. In other words, let’s say that, before, the work of art in the museum was more or less something you couldn’t discuss; it was the privilege of certain artists. Now this isn’t the case; the work of art in an institution is like anything else. And I think the public knows this. They know that they’re not necessarily going to see a masterpiece just because they enter a museum. They’re going to see something, and they might even fight against it. There’s no fear and not as much intimidation.122

In this sense, consistent with the logic of supply and demand, the proliferation of new art museums seems to have resulted in a critical devaluation of the art inside. Where the early ‘white cube’ might well have come across as an abstract (almost) sacred environment, today its ‘other worldly’ aura is suffering from over familiarity. To compound the effect of the proliferation of contemporary art museums/galleries, the ‘white cube’ has also broken free of the visual arts, and is now imposing its aesthetic (white walls, polished floors, track-lighting and slick hanging systems) on domestic homes and inner-city apartments. This in turn has further attuned the gallery visitor’s eye to the strings of ‘white cube’ puppetry, lessened the ability of the gallery to elevate the experience above the commonplace, and as a result, reduced the gallery’s ability to covertly activate the artworks within.

Recent operational changes within ‘new institutions’ have resulted in the museum/gallery becoming a surrounding frame for a wider range of art activity and ‘viewer’ interaction.123 ‘New institutionalism’ is typically characterised by an embracement of new curatorial practices, the foregrounding of the institution as a facilitator in the production of art, and an active participation in education and discourse (in a very broad sense). But such changes in institutional thinking have not, as yet, seriously challenged or altered the existence or physical appearance of the white-walled gallery, only the types of activities which go on within it. In fact it is difficult to

122 Daniel Buren quoted in Tim Griffin, ‘Daniel Buren and Olafur Eliasson in Conversation’ in Artforum (May, 2005), p. 210. 123 I use the word ‘viewer’ cautiously here because the ‘new institution’ audience is regarded as having a more participatory role than would likely be the case in a traditional art museum. For more on ‘new institutionalism’ see footnote 22 in the Introduction of this thesis. 76

imagine a situation where art will be completely free of a space which either visually resembles a ‘white cube’ or at least functions like one. Although the sacred aura may have gone, and the power to indiscriminately add kudos to its contents may have diminished, essentially the gallery as a repository or site for artistic vision, ideas, and activity (collaborative, performative, relational, or whatever) remains strong.

The changing face of the exhibition under ‘new institutionalism’ has however altered the frame as a signifier for a work as being ‘finished’. With exhibitions more commonly being approached as ‘works-in-progress’ or ‘laboratories’, framing is often required prior to an artwork or exhibition being complete.

The Wall as Passe-Partout / The Gallery as Frame. To a large extent, as already stated, the white-walled gallery remains the international standard for presenting contemporary art. If we compare how artworks are displayed within the gallery with how artworks are displayed within smaller ‘attached’ frames, it is possible to approach the white interior of the gallery as a kind of enlarged three- dimensional passe-partout for enlarged artworks. To embellish this analogy, the traditional framing model of ‘Artwork / (White) Matboard / Frame’ (as immortalised by Allan McCollum’s plaster surrogates [see Figure 27]) can be likened to the ‘Artwork / (White) Wall / Building’ formula of nearly all contemporary art museums/galleries. The difference between, say, a Thomas Demand photograph on a white wall in a gallery [see Figure 28] and a photograph with a white mat in a picture frame, is that we experience the latter from outside the frame. In contrast, with Demand, we are embedded within the frame of the art museum/gallery.

77

Figure 27: Allan McCollum, 100 Plaster Surrogates (1982-1990), enamel on cast hydrostone, 2180 x 9500 x 50 mm.

Figure 28: Thomas Demand, Klause (2006), installation view, Esther Schipper, Berlin.

Although the exterior of the museum/gallery is out of vision whilst experiencing the artworks inside, the building is still the first and last thing that we see during a visit to an exhibition, and like all frames, it mediates the experience. The effect of architecture on art was hinted at some forty years ago by Allan Kaprow when he suggested clearing out museums and letting the better designed ones exist as sculptures in their own

78

right.124 More recently the architectural container has been the focus of renewed attention due to, as Putnam notes, a tendency by new museums to proclaim status through their architecture in contrast to more established museums whose sense of power is conveyed through the prestige of their collection.125

One of the more notable examples of this new type of architecturally dominant art venue is the Guggenheim Museum in Bilboa designed by Frank Gehry [Figure 29]. This titanium-clad building has all the hallmarks of a ‘value added’ gilt frame. The building separates its contents from, and connects itself to, the surrounding cityscape in such dramatic fashion that it, unmistakably, conveys a sense of importance for what it contains. It does so, however, in such a brash and baroque way that the extent to which it inflects on the artworks within has to be questioned. There seems to be an echo of Pearson’s “alien presence”126 creeping into the art experience here with the fate of the artwork being at the mercy of an external overbearing architectural/aesthetic vision.

Figure 29: Guggenheim Museum, Bilboa.

124 Allan Kaprow and Robert Smithson, ‘What is a Museum?’ (1967) in Nancy Holt (ed), The Writings of Robert Smithson (New York: New York University Press, 1979), pp. 60-61. 125 Putnam, p. 184. For an interesting look at recent museum architecture see Victoria Newhouse, Towards a New Museum (New York: Monacelli Press, 1998). 126 See Pearson, p. 16. 79

However, with a few exceptions (Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim in New York included), once inside the white interior of a contemporary art museum/gallery, a degree of contextual amnesia is perhaps unavoidable. The notion of the white-walled gallery as a neutral non-competing space is in keeping with Ilya Kabokov’s early comments on Western display:

Only one thing is demanded from that … space: that it mustn’t interfere with the object existing and demonstrating itself. On a utilitarian level, this presupposes protection and the creation of comfortable circumstances for these objects: unrestrained arrangement, cleanliness, optimal temperature within the room, protection from humidity and cold. On a visual level, this means good, even light, neutral paint on all the walls, but the main thing is that the space shouldn’t draw attention to itself, it shouldn’t impede concentration on the object. In principle, it’s as though the space shouldn’t exist at all.127

In this respect, the museum/gallery functions a bit like a cage in a zoo: you see the monkey but not the jungle; the artwork but not the context that inspired and generated it; the fragment from an artist’s life but not the life itself. This rupture is offset by what Wolfgang Ernst calls a “hermeneutic surplus” which the museum/gallery creates and which thereby serves to intensify the artwork:

The institutional form of deprivation of context is the museum, but the museum space is double-edged. The paradox of its frame is that while it deprives and cuts works of art off from their so-called proper context, it provides them different contexts, a kind of hermeneutic surplus value.128

Similarly, Putnam sees the museum as essentially “a giant container” which reframes objects from their original context for “more considered viewing”.129 Robert Smithson, however, has bathed the gallery in a less favourable light, implying that the gallery can also create a kind of ‘hermeneutic deficit’:

127 Kabakov in Harrison and Wood, p. 1176. 128 Wolfgang Ernst, ‘Framing the Fragment: Archaeology, Art, Museum’ in Duro, p. 115. 129 Putnam, p. 36. 80

A work of art when placed in a gallery loses its charge, and becomes a portable object or surface disengaged from the outside world. A vacant white room with lights is still a submission to the neutral. Works of art seen in such spaces seem to be going through a kind of esthetic convalescence.130

What this discrepancy between Ernst’s ‘surplus’ and Smithson’s ‘deficit’ highlights, is that the function and effect of the museum/gallery is dependent upon what is being framed, and how the viewer interprets what they see. For example, ‘contextual rupture’ is not what immediately springs to mind when looking at a painting by Robert Ryman in a gallery, but it is a consideration when looking at (some) works by Richard Long in a gallery. With Ryman’s paintings, the wall is brought into the work as a formal element rather than being a neutral margin or contextual break. His paintings have a co- dependency with their surroundings, activating the space, whilst simultaneously being activated by it.

Given the non-picture aspect of the work, it’s essential that the wall be involved. The painting is never really confined to the paint plane itself... When the painting is removed from the wall it loses its composition and ceases to exist... That being the case, naturally the type of wall it’s on would be of importance. If there’s a corner you in effect have a line that can come into play - or a line where the floor plane joins the wall. Of course the height and the size of the wall and its color and to a certain extent its texture affect the painting.131

Despite the major role played by white-walled galleries in the presentation of contemporary art, there has been a significant number of recent exhibitions which have

130 Robert Smithson, ‘Cultural Confinement’ in Holt, p. 132. 131 Robert Ryman, Ryman on his Paintings (London: Tate Gallery, exhibition brochure, 17 February - 25 April 1993), unpaginated. 81

reversed the minimal ‘white cube’ aesthetic.132 And even when art does take place within a white-walled gallery, the art is not necessarily as shaped or dictated by such a context as it once might have been. In his article ‘Bureaux de Change’ (2006) Alex Farquharson suggests that ‘new institutionalism’ and much recent art “side-steps the problem of the white cube” (as a highly idealised space, and as a physical and temporal break between the reception of art and the context of art’s production) not by bowing to the rhetoric of the white-walled gallery’s accrued history, but rather, by over-riding it and forcing it (the gallery) to be defined by its contents. The function of the contemporary ‘white cube’ is thus, to an extent, variable and unpredictable.

If white-walled rooms are the site for exhibitions one week, a recording studio or political workshop the next, then it is no longer the container that defines the contents as art, but the contents that determine the identity of the container.133

How the Gallery and Independent Frame Function Together. Due to their shared functions and inter-related histories, there will always be a dynamic relationship (a reliance or balance) between an ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ frame. When a wall or environment is likely to be transient or out of an artist’s control, an attached ‘immediate’ frame can offer an artwork a more controlled and consistent setting. When no such frame is present, the ‘extended’ frame or setting is forced to collaborate more intimately with the work than would otherwise be the case.

132 Notable examples of these are, among many others, Zombie Golf (1995) at Bankspace, London; Utopian Station (2003) curated by Molly Nesbit, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Rirkrit Tiravanija at the 50th Venice Biennale; and Within Reach (2003) by Chris Ofili in the British Pavilion also at the 50th Venice Biennale. 133 Alex Farquharson, ‘Bureaux de Change’ in Frieze (Issue 101, September 2006), p. 158. This view is shared by O’Doherty (2007), p. 40. 82

Chapter 2: Frame or ‘Frame’? Framing or ‘Framing’? Framed or Frameless?

Existing Methods of Frame Description and Identification. Below are four descriptions of physical frames taken from two very different sources. The first two descriptions describe period frames and were taken from the Bonhams and Brooks Fine English and European Carved and Composition Frames auction catalogue for a sale held in London in 2001.1 The latter two frame descriptions were taken from the Counter Editions 2001 catalogue which lists a collection of prints and multiples by leading contemporary artists (predominantly from the UK).2

As the Bonhams and Brooks catalogue was produced especially for an auction of frames - with the frames being sold as objects in their own right, independent of art - no mention of artworks were included in the descriptions or illustrations of the frames [see Figure 30]. In contrast, Counter Editions are selling artworks, and the frame details are presented in a more auxiliary fashion. The third frame description, I should therefore add, describes the frame for The Cleric (2000) by Gary Hume [Figure 31] which is a silkscreen print in six colours and one glaze, printed on 400 gsm Somerset; the fourth describes the frame for Jeff Burton’s Untitled (Swim Trunks) (2000) which is a cibachrome print.3 It should also be noted that Counter Editions state within their catalogue that each frame has been specified by the artist and fabricated by Darbyshire Framemakers, who they describe as the UK’s leading art framer.4

1 See Bonhams & Brooks, Fine English and European Carved and Composition Frames (London: Bonhams & Brooks, auction catalogue, Sale Number 28,704, 11am, 12 July 2001). 2 See Counter Editions, Counter Editions 2001 (London: Counter Editions, 2001). The Counter Editions catalogue is also online at http://www.countereditions.com [4 May 2005]. 3 I have included the specifications for the artworks here because they are relevant to how the works have been framed. 4 Counter Editions, Counter Editions 2001, unpaginated. 83

Figure 30: Provincial Louis XIV carved and gilded frame as illustrated in the Bonhams and Brooks auction catalogue.

Frame description 1: A provincial Louis XIV carved and gilded frame, with plain panels to the stylised leaf and flower ogee sight, sanded frieze, leaf, flower and strapwork to the cross-hatched cushion-moulded hollow with palmette cartouche

centres and leaf corners. 34 5/8 x 28 x 4 1/8in. (87.9 x 71.1 x 10.4cm.)5

Frame description 2: An English late 19th Century gilded oak Whistler style moulding frame, with later plain sight, cluster-reeded mid-section, plain frieze, and cluster- reeded cushion-moulded top edge. 26 1/2 x 20 1/4 x 5 3/4in. (67.3 x 51.4 x

14.6cm.)6

5 Bonhams & Brooks, Fine English and European Carved and Composition Frames, Lot 14, p. 5. 6 Ibid., Lot 93, p. 12. 84

Figure 31: Gary Hume, The Cleric (2000), silkscreen print on paper, 940 x 690 mm, frame size: 1020 x 760 mm.

Frame description 3: Frame details: maple frame, sprayed with soft white matt lacquer. The print is float-mounted on acid free white board, and is glazed in 3mm clear Perspex. Comes complete with a split-baton hanging device. Frame size:

102x76cm (40x30in)7

Frame description 4: Frame details: the photograph is laminated between two layers of Perspex, with polished edges. Comes complete with split-baton hanging device. Frame size: 29x44cm (12x17in)8

7 Counter Editions, Counter Editions 2001, unpaginated. Frame details for The Cleric (2000) by Gary Hume. 8 Ibid. Frame details for Untitled (Swim Trunks) (2000) by Jeff Burton. 85 Exhibited within these four examples are various methods of identification and description for physical frames in the visual arts. The first two descriptions start with geographic origin and period: “provincial Louis XIV” (ie., late seventeenth-century / early eighteenth-century France) and “English late 19th Century”. They then move on to a basic physical description of the frame and materials used: “carved and gilded frame” and “gilded oak Whistler style frame” (“Whistler” referring to the nineteenth-century artist James Abbott McNeill Whistler who often designed his own frames for his paintings). The frame descriptions then get more detailed, starting at the inner sight edge of each frame and working outwards. Descriptions of frame profile (the frame in cross-section) - described by terms such as “ogee”, “frieze”, “cushion-moulded hollow” and “cluster-reeded mid-section” - are mixed with descriptions of ornament and embellishment - such as “leaf, flower and strapwork” and “palmette cartouche centres and leaf corners”. Finally, the frame is given a size.

As the third and fourth described frames are produced by “the UK’s leading art framers” we already know their geographical place of origin and that the frames are contemporary. The descriptions concentrate on the frames’ materials (maple, lacquer, acid-free board and Perspex); and on the finish and appearance (“soft white matt lacquer” and “polished edges”). Curiously, there is no description of profile with the third frame, but the front-on image in the catalogue indicates a box frame [see Figure 31].

Another way of looking at the physical frame - other than by its place of origin, period, style, profile or physical appearance - is offered by Mitchell and Roberts in Frameworks: Form, Function & Ornament in European Portrait Frames. They express the relationship between the frame and the picture it contains in the following four ways:

86 a) ‘original for’ = the existing frame was the first frame for the picture; b) ‘contemporary for’ = the frame is of the same nationality and period as the picture; c) ‘made for’ = the frame was made for at a later date; d) ‘on’ = the frame applied to the picture is not necessarily contemporary or of the same nationality.9

Mitchell and Roberts also break the historical frame down as follows:

The types of frames may be broadly defined in three groups, governed by the pictures purpose, setting and owner. Ecclesiastical frames generally reflect the architectural style of their settings, reinforcing Catholic imagery or Protestant austerity. Court frames, commissioned by rulers and nobility, represent an essential, and long under-estimated, component of the arts employed for propaganda purposes and as a status symbol, expressed through grandeur, luxury and sculptural magnificence; they may also have pictorial or family emblematic devices emphasizing subject and ownership. Secular frames, the greatest volume of production for domestic consumption, are often the standard and most economic ‘pattern book versions of court frames; their style and cost conformed to prevailing interior decoration and to the perceived significance of the painting. Within these main areas the style of the frame may also depend on the subject- matter of the picture: religious, mythological, historical, portrait, genre, landscape, still-life or abstract.10

Brettell on the other hand claims that throughout history, frames can be divided into two types: ‘architectural’ and ‘ornamental’. The former being more geometric and simpler in design, eschewing the “curvilinear forms” which he notes as “anti-architectural”; the latter being orientated more towards furniture and the decorative arts.11

9 Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts, Frameworks (London: Merrell Holberton, 1996), p. 19. 10 Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts, A History of European Picture Frames (London: Merrell Holberton, 1996), p. 8. My emphasis in quotation. 11 Richard R. Brettell and Steven Starling, The Art of the Edge: European Frames 1300 - 1900 (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 1986), pp. 13-14. 87 Cadre/Cornice/Frame. In his essay ‘The Frame of Representation and Some of its Figures’ Louis Marin takes an etymological look at the word “frame” in French (cadre), Italian (cornice) and English. He asserts that “Frame as cadre signifies the border of wood (or some other material) into which one places a picture”. He continues that the word cadre derives from square (carré) and thus the French language “emphasizes the notion of border: the frame decorates the outer limit of the geometrically delimited surface of the canvas”.12 In Italian, Marin claims that values of “ornament and protection”, as well as “notions of fullness and projection”, are at play in the term cornice. Originally adopted from architecture, cornice denotes “the edge that runs around a building to keep off the rain” (which can be both functional and decorative) or the “projecting molding that crowns all manner of works, notably the entablature’s frieze in classical architecture”.13 Finally in English, frame, he proposes, “signifies rather a structural element of the picture’s construction, where picture is understood more as canvas than as representation or image”. In English, he asserts, “frame can be something upon which the canvas is stretched in order to make it ready to receive pigments. Rather than an edge or border, rather than an edging ornament, it supports the substructure and the surface of representation”.14

From this assessment it appears that Marin is claiming that the word frame (in English) implies structural integrality rather than something which is added to an artwork ‘parergonally’ after its completion. This would be true for many modern and contemporary paintings where the stretcher frame plays an elevated role and where an attached independent frame may not exist at all. However, it should be noted that the notion of the frame as border existed prior to the stretcher frame. Textile supports (and thus their stretcher frames) first started to appear in the fifteenth century when developments in (oil) paints allowed for more flexible supports to be used,15 and they did not start to replace wooden panels as the principal support in European painting until the early sixteenth century.16 With this said, it could be argued that early large-

12 Louis Marin, ‘The Frame of Representation and Some of its Figures’ in Paul Duro (ed), The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 81. 13 Ibid., pp. 81-82. 14 Ibid., p. 82. 15 See Ray Smith, The Artist’s Handbook (London: Dorling Kindersley, 2003), p. 43 and 170. 16 See Knut Nicolaus, The Restoration of Paintings (Cologne: Konemann, 1999), p. 80. 88 scale panel paintings also required an element of carpentry and concealed structural framework in order to give the panels increased structural integrity, which would thus bolster Marin’s argument that the frame in English implies structural integrality rather than (or as well as) a peripheral border.

The Plethora of Frame Categories. As we can already see, a dizzying array of frame categories and frame appellations exist. So far in this thesis, we have mentioned the ‘artist’s’ frame, the ‘institutional’ frame, the ‘circumtextual’ frame, the ‘intracompositional’ frame, the ‘parergonal’ frame, the ‘value-added’ frame, the ‘Comondo’ frame, the ‘decape’ frame, the ‘sculptor’s’ frame, the ‘pipe’ frame, the ‘en fuite’ frame, the ‘trophy’ frame, the ‘ecclesiastical’ frame, the ‘court’ frame, the ‘secular’ frame ... and this is by no means an exhaustive list of the frame types already cited. In fact, because of the scope of the term “frame” and because of the sheer amount of pre-existing frame categories, it is almost impossible to discuss the frame without appearing to adopt a slightly over zealous taxonomic vernacular. This should not, however, deter the introduction of new framing terms for consideration, if in fact, they create a clearer and more complete spectrum of frames, or if they help to clarify and refine existing terminology.

Although some frame categories obviously have more relevance and currency amongst contemporary artists than others and are used widely and often (such as the ‘institutional’ frame), some are invented and used more fleetingly in order to describe individual framing experiences. For example, following a recent visit to a painting installation in which a wall and window had been (strategically) constructed in front of the exhibited paintings - thus creating an uncomfortable viewing distance between the viewer and paintings - a friend offered me a new frame category: the ‘sadistic’ frame.17

The plethora of frame categories already in circulation (albeit a limited circulation perhaps) would seem to make the conception of a usable and complete spectrum of physical frames specific to contemporary art a fairly straightforward exercise. However, in practice, more than a simple re-ordering of existing frame categories is required. Many of the frame types within this sea of frame names exist in isolation from any other frame category - the ‘sadistic’ frame being a case in point. Other frame categories have

17 I am referring here to Matthys Gerber’s dio rama exhibition at Artspace, Sydney, 3-26 March 2005. 89 developed on a more metaphorical level (a ‘cognitive’ frame would certainly qualify here; as would, to a lesser extent, Kosuth’s ‘first’ and ‘second’ frames), which are relevant and useful up to a point, but are not directly transferable as categories for physical frames.

The Frame as ‘Text’. We have dealt so far predominantly with the physical frame as an object (or configuration of objects): as something describable through its materials and form, predominantly controlled by the artist through his or her ‘active’ framing process(es), and that through implication has a ‘passive’ viewer. I would like at this stage to introduce the notion of the frame as ‘text’.

Although the physical characteristics of a frame can be described as ‘given’, the interpretations of a frame are less fixed. As soon as a physical frame is exposed to individual perception, myriad metaphorical ‘framings’ occur. Therefore, an artist can control the frame as ‘object’ (what it is made of, how big it is etc.) but not the frame as ‘text’ (how it will be perceived or what it might mean). Meaning is thus generated through interpretive encounters between the frame and a ‘non-passive’ reader. A frame therefore, as with an artwork, is far from stable: it is unavoidably locked into a process of interpretation and deconstructive (re)evaluation by an ‘active’ viewer/reader. This means that a physical frame might be seen as one thing today, but something quite different tomorrow.

Frame or ‘Frame’? Framing or ‘Framing’? One of the first things to do when reading a written text about framing or the frame is to try and decipher as quickly as possible what basic type of frame (physical or metaphorical) the author is writing about, and from what framing perspective (‘prior’ or ‘post’) the author is writing from, so that the text can start to make sense. In the visual arts the frame can be further dissected into whether it is an ‘immediate’ or ‘extended’ frame, and so on from there.

90 Although it is sometimes problematic to discuss frames as being either physical or metaphorical,18 there is a tendency nonetheless to divide the frame up in such a way, as the following quotation typifies:

… we can nevertheless regard a ‘frame’, whether material or metaphorical, as the result of an act of ‘framing’…19

Framing can itself be said to occur from two perspectives: from the perspective of the artist or frame-maker who produces the frame for the artwork (ie., ‘prior’ framing), and from the perspective of the audience who ‘frames’ the artwork metaphorically through their interpretation of it (ie., ‘post’ framing).

The importance of making explicit the differences between ‘prior’ and ‘post’ framing, and between physical and metaphorical frames, may seem obvious, but when it comes to theoretical discussions surrounding framing and the frame, these differences are not always asserted or clear.

Not surprisingly, some discourse interchange takes place between physical and metaphorical frames and the two framing perspectives mentioned above. Philosophers and theorists concerned with language and interpretation have a tendency to use physical frames as metaphors to explain their own non-tangible framing theories.20 And art theorists when writing about the physical frame and framing in visual art, have a tendency to draw upon framing theory written for other disciplines, often with metaphorical frames in mind or from a ‘post’ framing perspective.21 Although cross- pollination is generally a positive thing, with regard to the contemporary visual arts, the necessity to seek knowledge from related discourses is partially the result of a lack of available theoretical research devoted specifically to the contemporary physical frame

18 ‘Institutional’ and ‘curatorial’ frames, for example, can be regarded as both physical and metaphorical. Although the primary focus of this thesis is on the physical frame, it is not my intention, however, to disconnect the material frame from its associated metaphorical frames, nor to separate the frame from its associated artwork(s). 19 Gale MacLachlan and Ian Reid, Framing and Interpretation (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1994), p. 17. 20 I am thinking here particularly of Derrida, and MacLachlan and Reid, but also, less obviously, of John H. Pearson who conflates visual art framing theory with literary framing theory in his essay ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’ in Mosaic (23/1, 1990), pp. 15-30. 21 I offer my own adoption of MacLachlan and Reid’s ‘circumtextual’ frame in this thesis as an example here, which is the result of MacLachlan and Reid’s ‘post’ framing perspective. 91 from within contemporary art itself, as well as to the elusiveness of theoretical (ie., not purely historical or technical) discussion relating to ‘prior’ framing.22 In contrast, there is an abundance of framing theory written about metaphorical frames or from a ‘post’ framing perspective. Framing and Interpretation (1994) by Gale MacLachlan and Ian Reid gives an extensive cross-disciplinary analysis of how various theorists from across the humanities and social have used framing metaphorically in a multitude of ways.

Although MacLachlan and Reid’s book articulates explicitly how it employs the terms ‘frame’ and ‘framing’, it also draws attention to how these terms “are often used imprecisely and sometimes in highly specialised technical ways without much regard for other uses”.23 Also pointing to the dangers of a loosely defined frame, Pearson notes that when used openly to relate “to both the plastic and literary arts”, the term “frame” is fraught with problems which can “question the validity of interartistic study”.24

Defining the Frame. The duality of the term frame (or ‘frame’), and framing (or ‘framing’), as discussed above, not to mention the plurality of both words in a broader context, problematises the task of realising a concise and reliable definition for what a frame is, and what framing actually encompasses. This should not necessarily discourage an attempt to realise a suitable definition for a specific type of frame, nor should it deter an attempt to define that specific frame’s function(s). It is however an acknowledgment that in order to come up with a reductive definition - one that is reliable but at the same time retains enough information to be useful - it is necessary to first reduce the scope of the type of frame which is being defined.

One definition for a physical frame at the point of exhibition in the visual arts could read as follows: a material unit (or set of units) surrounding, attached to, or forming part of an artwork, the purpose of which is to negotiate (physical and conceptual) space for

22 In the area of Conservation Framing, research and discussion is relatively widespread as attested by the two day international conference Mounting and Housing Art on Paper for Storage and Display hosted by the British Museum, 19-20 May 2005, however, the angle here was predominantly historical and scientific. 23 See MacLachlan and Reid, p. 17. 24 Pearson, p. 18. 92 an artwork, and to offer (physical and conceptual) protection for an artwork, during its display.

This definition is as valid for ‘immediate’ framing devices (such as picture frames, vitrines, and pins), as it is for more ‘extended’ forms of framing (such as exhibition design, the distribution of press-releases, and the positioning of gallery labels).

The Act of Framing by the Artist or Frame-Maker (‘Prior’ Framing). The framing of an artwork could be described at its most rudimentary and physical level as the selection of a frame, the selection of the appropriate materials to produce that frame, and the implementation of the frame’s production.

MacLachlan and Reid refer fleetingly to ‘prior’ framing to describe framing which occurs prior to the kinds of interpretative framing in which they are interested.25 They refer to interpretation simply as framing. As the perspective and emphasis of this thesis differs from theirs, it is more appropriate here to refer to acts of interpretation as ‘post’ framing. It should also be noted that ‘prior’ framing is not an ‘art-specific’ activity: it refers to framing acts which occur prior to interpretation, and can be used in relation to the spoken word and literature, as well as to the visual arts.

Interpretation as an Act of ‘Framing’ (‘Post’ Framing). When viewers to an exhibition interpret what they see, they are engaging in acts of ‘framing’. In this respect, viewers of an artwork draw upon their individual knowledge base, gleaned from their individual experiences, which is stored, according to cognitive science, in ‘cognitive’ frames within the human memory.26 The viewers’ perception of the work in front of them dictates which ‘frames’ are activated or recalled. For example, if a viewer was to identify some of the hallmark characteristics associated with Fauvism in a contemporary painting, such as bold gestural brush strokes and the use of bright colours, then this knowledge of art history would, to a variable extent, help to ‘frame’ his or her reading of the painting.

25 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 58. 26 For a concise overview of cognitive science and ‘frames’ see MacLachlan and Reid, pp. 68-77. 93 ‘Extratextual’, ‘Intratextual’, ‘Intertextual’ and ‘Circumtextual’ Framing. In their publication Framing and Interpretation, MacLachlan and Reid look at ‘extratextual’, ‘intratextual’, ‘intertextual’ and ‘circumtextual’ framing and discuss the the roles that these play within any act of interpretation. MacLachlan and Reid’s analysis of these four ‘post’ framing categories can be seen as an attempt to break down how a viewer/reader constructs meaning from an artwork/text by trying to describe where information is located: outside (extra), inside (intra), or around (circum) the artwork/text, or between (inter) artworks/texts.

The four types of ‘framing’ can be briefly described as follows:

‘Extratextual’ framing depends on outside information “unspecified by the text but felt to be presupposed by it”.27 For example, MacLachlan and Reid provide the following mini-story and explanation:

(1) Duval went into the restaurant. He ordered pasta and a glass of red wine. He asked the waitress for the bill and left.

At first sight, narrative sequences such as this would seem to pose no problems of comprehension whatsoever. And yet the ability to process such a sequence and make immediate sense of it presupposes more than purely linguistic knowledge about the meanings of the individual words and the syntactical connections between them. On closer inspection it is obvious that nowhere in the actual sentences that make up the narrative can we find all the information needed to understand it... Given their familiarity with what generally happens in restaurants, readers automatically supply these missing links, which are assumed by the text in the interests of narrative economy… Duval presumably waited to be seated, consulted the menu, ordered a meal from a waitress, was served, ate his meal and paid for it

27 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 3. MacLachlan and Reid focus predominantly on the interpretation of oral and written texts, but ‘text’ can be interpreted here in a broader sense to make it applicable to the visual arts. 94 before leaving. Other intermediate steps and variants on this sequence could be adduced by individual readers.28

MacLachlan and Reid point out that whatever we read, we ‘frame’ ‘extratextually’ by “drawing on our accumulated knowledge of the world, both experiential and textually mediated”. This activity can include, among other things, provisionally assigning a text to “a particular text-type or genre”.29 All works of contemporary art, and all communicative ‘texts’ in general, assume in the viewer at least some prior knowledge or understanding of language (visual or otherwise) in order for them to make sense. It is therefore not necessary, even if it was possible, for contemporary artists to explain the history of art every time they exhibit a painting, or the history of the ‘readymade’ every time they use a found object. Such ‘extratextual’ information, it is assumed, will be provided by the viewer. This process of ‘extratextual’ framing is purely metaphorical, extremely complex and ultimately unique to each viewer. It therefore creates a somewhat fuzzy interpretative border for the artwork.

‘Intratextual’ framing occurs when looking at information considered to be contained within the ‘text’. For example, with regard to written texts, this would include internal framing devices such as subsections, paragraphs, chapters, italics, and footnotes; as well as how the words are represented typographically and where the text is located physically: “scrawled on a wall, inscribed in stone, or printed on a badge”. These ‘intratexual’ elements cue the process of ‘extratextual’ framing.30

‘Intertextual’ framing requires the relating of one ‘text’ or text-type to another. For example, Hany Armanious’ painting Lantana Lovers Under Moon Fire By Hurtle Duffield From Patrick White’s The Vivesector (2004) [Figure 32] operates intertextually with the novel to which it refers to in its title, ie., The Vivesector by Patrick White.

28 Ibid., pp. 1-2. 29 Ibid., pp. 3-4. 30 Ibid., p. 4 and p. 76. 95 Figure 32: Hany Armanious, Lantana Lovers Under Moon Fire By Hurtle Duffield From Patrick White’s The Vivesector (2004).

‘Circumtextual’ framing depends on the interpretation of everything else around the ‘text’, as follows:

In addition, our reading of a text can be framed for us by the circumtextual features (circum, ‘around’) of its material presentation and location in space. For example, the title of this book and the presence of references, a bibliography and an index, as well as the kind of bookshop where it is sold, all contribute to the way readers interpret the information it contains. These framing cues help to establish the scholarly affiliations of the book, distinguishing it from, say, popular fiction.31

In written texts, circumtextual frames associated with the material packaging of the text have the capacity to carry the most obvious messages about how the text should be read… they are also likely to be the first messages of this kind that we encounter in the reading process.32

31 Ibid., p. 4. 32 Ibid., pp. 106-107. 96 In the visual arts, ‘circumtextual’ factors that can prime our experience of an artwork - prior to us actually seeing the work - include the type of space in which the work is sited (an artist-run-initiative, a commercial gallery, a home furnishings store, a museum etc.) as well as every other piece of surrounding information which contributes to how the artwork is approached and ‘read’, including gallery labels, wall texts, exhibition catalogues, traffic noise, publicity cards etc.

Gallery visitors generally ‘forget’ that an art work is viewed within a series of embedded circumtextual frames - the physical margins of the canvas, the enclosing wooden or metal outline, the title, caption, alcove, wall, lighting effects, adjacent pictures, room, exhibition and so on. The danger of such amnesia is that we remain unaware of the mediating agencies that control our interpretation of what we see.33

Invisibility - ‘THIS FRAME WILL SELF-DESTRUCT MOMENTARILY AFTER ENGAGEMENT BY THE VIEWER WITH THE ARTWORK’. As Duro points out in his Introduction to The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork (and as quoted earlier in my own Introduction) “The task of any discussion of frames and framing in the visual arts is first and foremost to counter the tendency of the frame to invisibility with respect to the artwork”.34 This “quasi- invisibility” - as MacLachlan and Reid refer to it35 - is often considered to be a prerequisite of a frame.

... the frame does not call attention to itself. Proof of that is simple. If each of you were to reflect upon the paintings you know best, you would find that you cannot recall the frames in which they are set. We are not used to seeing a frame except when it is in the carpenter’s shop, bereft of a painting; that is, when the frame is not fulfilling its function, when it’s, so to speak, out of a job.36

33 Ibid., p. 34. 34 Duro, p. 1. 35 See MacLachlan and Reid, p. 6. 36 Jose Ortega y Gasset (translated by Andrea L Bell), ‘Meditations on the Frame’ in Brettell and Starling, p. 23. 97 It is when a frame has ‘a job’ and is functioning as so (when it is presenting an artwork rather than vying for attention itself) that the frame could be said to be most vulnerable to ‘invisibility’.

... the parergon is a form which has as its traditional determination not that it stands out but that it disappears, buries itself, effaces itself, melts away at the moment it deploys its greatest energy.37

However, it is possible to deduce from the above two quotations that a (‘parergonal’) frame is not necessarily destined to ‘invisibility’ per se, but rather, that a subtle or innocuous frame when functioning in a subservient manner has a tendency to be ignored. And if it can be assumed that such a frame has a tendency to ‘invisibility’, willfully disappearing to allow an artwork to take centre-stage, then it might also be assumed that an assertive or inappropriate frame could function quite differently. For it is not inevitable that a frame is destined to be naturalised to infinity by the viewer; a frame can also (on occasion) stand out against an artwork and cause a distraction.

... frames compete for our attention not only with each other, but directly with paintings. Their position in this unequal battle is virtually always a losing one, and, when they do win, we dislike them for it!38

The assertion that we dislike frames for being noticed is, however, a flattening statement which assumes all frames have similar intentions. An artist might be quite content for a ‘disengaged’ frame to be ignored, but not so pleased for a ‘supplementary’ frame to go unnoticed. In fact, it could be claimed that a ‘supplementary’, ‘intrinsic’ or ‘absolute’ frame that is not being noticed is not fully functioning - or failing to do its ‘job’ properly.

Whilst it is true, to an extent, that ‘disengaged’ or ‘parergonal’ frames have a tendency to ‘invisibility’ - due to the artwork putting everything to work to render the frame inconsequential in comparison to itself - things become more complex when looking at ‘intracompositional’ frames.

37 Jacques Derrida (translated by Geoff Bennington & Ian McLeod), The Truth in Painting (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), p. 61. 38 Brettell in Brettell and Starling, p. 20. 98

An ‘intracompositional’ frame has a somewhat paradoxical relationship with regard to ‘invisibility’ and being noticed. On one level, artists employ ‘intracompositional’ frames to deter distracting or inappropriate frames from being applied to their artworks after they have been completed: the resulting frames often blend in seamlessly with the works, almost to the point of being indistinguishable as separate entities, thereby attaining a degree of invisibility. On another level, because ‘intracompositional’ frames are considered integral to the works, it is essential that they get noticed and are not disregarded by the viewer.

MacLachlan and Reid note that the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, hold a painting by Sir Edward Poynter entitled The Visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon (1890) [Figure 33] which has a frame that could be described as ‘intracompositional’.

Figure 33: Sir Edward Poynter, The Visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon (1890), oil on Canvas, 2345 x 3505 mm. Frame designed by the artist.

99 This spectacular work (2.3 x 3.5m) depicts the Queen inside a Greek- inspired classical temple mounting a flight of stairs flanked by golden lions to greet the King. The whole is enclosed by an extraordinarily extravagant Renaissance-inspired gilt frame that is ‘architectural’ in its effect since it incorporates classically decorated Greek pilasters and horizontals which repeat themes depicted in the painting.39

Such a frame, MacLachlan and Reid claim, harmonises so perfectly with the depicted scene that despite its unique form and prominence, it too “tends nevertheless to be ‘forgotten’. Once again, it would seem that whether or not the frame of a painting is felt to be intrinsic or extrinsic to the work, in either case it is usually destined to near- invisibility”.40

I would argue, however, that in some instances the frame is merely being ignored as a separate enclosure extrinsic from the work rather than being ignored altogether. For it stands to reason that if a frame forms part of a work - and momentarily after engagement with that work, the frame miraculously disappears - then we must be ignoring or unable to see a part of the work. In such cases, it seems reasonable to assert that we do in fact still see the frame, but we might not see it as a frame or as distinct from the work. This argument is reinforced when applied to contemporary artworks such as Damien Hirst’s A Thousand Years (1990) [see Figure 3] and Marc Quinn’s Self (1990) [see Figure 74].

The assumption of ‘invisibility’ also puts all audiences on the same footing. It does not allow for the unique circumstances and experiences of the viewer who is supposedly ‘not seeing’ or ‘forgetting’ the frame. For example, a frame-maker or gilder might possibly have a much better recollection of a frame than they would a painting. In such cases, it would be the artwork which gets naturalised to near oblivion, not the frame. Not to mention the fact that audience sensibilities to context, site and the frame have changed significantly in recent times. The ‘institutional’ frame, for example, has not always been as visible as it is now.

39 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 25. 40 Ibid., p. 25. 100 With this rather obvious but important point made, the frame’s tendency to ‘invisibility’ is greatly aided by the notion of the frame as a neutral zone or void. Rosen acknowledges this when he describes the frame in its modernist context as an “invisible border” and “transparent vehicle” designed to “avoid formal or contextual conflict with the object contained”.41 Traber too, characterises the frame as a blank in-between world which “exists by virtue of what is internal and external to it”. The frame, she claims, “can be compared to a computer interface, determining the flow of information between artwork and the viewer, but itself empty”.42

In Reading Images: The Grammar of Visual Design (1996), Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen discuss internal framing within visual compositions and how ‘space frames’ can be used as devices for creating separate units of information. Here the frame is characterised as a gap, a void, and a separation device much like a pause in music or an empty space on a page, as follows:

In temporally integrated texts framing is, again, effected [sic] by rhythm. From time to time the ongoing equal-timed cycles of rhythm are momentarily interrupted by a pause, a rallentando, a change of gait, and these junctures mark off distinct units, disconnect stretches of speech or music or movement from each other to a greater or lesser degree. Where such junctures are absent, the elements are connected in a continuous flow. In spatially integrated compositions it is no different. The elements or groups of elements are either disconnected, marked off from each other, or connected, joined together. And visual framing, too, is a matter of degree: elements of the composition may be strongly or weakly framed. The stronger the framing of an element, the more it is presented as a separate unit of information.43

41 Jeff Rosen, ‘Strategies of Containment: The Manipulation of the Frame in Contemporary Photography’ in Afterimage (Vol. 17, No. 5, December, 1989), p. 13. 42 Christine Traber, ‘In Perfect Harmony? Escaping the Frame in the Early 20th Century’ in Eva Mendgen (ed), In Perfect Harmony: Picture and Frame 1850-1920 (Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum, 1995), pp. 221-222. 43 Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen, Reading Images (Geelong: Deakin University Press, 1990), pp. 214-215. 101 Writing about the AIDS Memorial Quilt (a giant on-going quilt made up of 3’ x 6’ individually-made and unique panels to commemorate people who have died of AIDS- related illness), Rico Franses notes how the absence of space frames within the quilt’s construction can be seen as “the visual equivalent of no-gap writing”.

What distinguishes our system of post-printing writing is that it separates words from one another. In early literate societies, as in ancient Greece, words were generally run together without separation. It is only in more recent times that our written words have been separated and given a space frame that surrounds them... In the quilt, the signifier does not stand alone, surrounded by a space frame. Instead it abuts the next signifier on all sides, with no frame between them.44

Jose Ortega y Gasset acknowledges the frame as an “isolator”, stating that “In order to isolate one thing from another, a third thing is needed which must neither be like the first nor the second - a neutral object”.45

The frame as a blank or neutral space (rather than as a unit of information in its own right) which is used as a ‘break’ to either control the way the eye moves around within a composition or to control the pace at which an artwork radiates outwards towards its audience is also referred to by Pearson in relation to Degas’ white frames, which he states resemble the typographical “margins of a printed page”.46 However, what Pearson, Franses, Kress and van Leeuwan are no doubt driving at is not so much that the space frame is ultimately neutral or invisible, but that surrounding empty voids have, as Shapiro had also noted, “a latent expressiveness” which can be used to great effect and are therefore neither semiotically neutral nor invisible.47

Another explanation for the frame’s propensity to ‘invisibility’ is one of camouflage, as a frame can attain a faux-invisibility through assimilation with its surroundings. For example, a heavily carved Grinling Gibbons frame if viewed in isolation against a white

44 Rico Franses, ‘Postmonumentality: Frame, Grid, Space, Quilt’ in Duro, p. 262. 45 Ortega y Gasset in Brettell and Starling, p. 24. 46 Pearson, p. 19. 47 Meyer Schapiro, ‘On Some Problems in the Semiotics of Visual Art: Field and Vehicle in Image - Signs’ in Semiotica (1, 3, 1969), p. 229. 102 wall would stand out fairly prominently (even in relation to any painting it might contain). However, if placed within a more opulent interior, with carved over-mantels, cornices and door-frames, the frame would be far more inconspicuous [see Figure 5]. As this example shows, a frame’s ‘invisibility’ is not only reliant on the presence of an artwork (and an agreeable way in which the frame relates to it), it is also dependent on its surroundings - what lays outside of the frame.

Despite the assumption that the frame is destined to self-destruct seconds after it being noticed, this can only happen if the frame is disattended; if it is ignored or forgotten. It seems reasonable to say that this only happens after the frame’s relevance has been graded (consciously or not) by the viewer. A reluctance to see the frame and grade it accordingly could be regarded - by current standards in contextual awareness - as failure. However, this condition is not unique to the frame. If we consider how artworks in exhibitions function in comparison to how they function in domestic settings - when social interaction and visual familiarity act to conceal what is physically in front of us - it is clear that artworks too (and everything else for that matter) can be prone to relative ‘invisibility’.

Acknowledging Context, Site and the Frame (Similarities and Differences).

It has been the special genius of our century to investigate things in relation to their context, to come to see context as formative on the thing, and, finally, to see the context as a thing in itself.48

The move away from the discreet self-sufficient art object in the visual arts has resulted in a heightened awareness and understanding of the setting or space within which artworks are located and experienced. However, this shift in focus from an internal aesthetic to an external aesthetic, has also lead to a discernible homogenisation and interchangeability between three terms – context, site and frame - which fails to acknowledge some of the fundamental differences between them.

48 Thomas McEvilley in Brian O’Doherty (Introduction by Thomas McEvilley), Inside the White Cube (San Francisco: The Lapis Press, 1986), p. 7. 103 In his essay ‘From Work to Frame, or is There Life After “The Death of the Author”’, Craig Owen states that “It is customary to attribute recognition of the importance of the frame in constituting the work of art to Duchamp (the ‘readymade’ requires its institutional setting in order to be perceived as a work of art)”.49 However, it is with regard to Robert Smithson’s remark that the great issue for art in the 1970s will be “the investigation of the apparatus the artist is threaded through” 50 (the ‘institutional’ frame), which Owen then links to Roland Barthes’ 1967 essay ‘The Death of the Author’,51 which forms the conceptual underpinning for his account of the postmodern shift of focus from the artwork to the frame:

… postmodernism approaches the empty space left by the author’s disappearance from a different perspective, one which brings to light a number of questions that modernism, with its exclusive focus on the work of art and its “creator”, either ignored or repressed: Where do exchanges between readers and viewers take place? Who is free to define, manipulate and, ultimately, to benefit from the codes and conventions of cultural production? These questions shift attention away from the work and its producer and onto its frame - the first, by focusing on the location in which the work of art is encountered; the second, by insisting on the social nature

of artistic production and reception.52

Owen notes that Marcel Broodthaers’ imaginary museum Musée d’Art Moderne - Département des Aigles (1968-72) [Figure 34] was “one of the earliest instances of the postmodern displacement from work to frame”. He describes how for the museum’s inaugural exhibition, Broodthaers placed empty packing crates (the kind customarily used to transport works of art, complete with stenciled ‘handle with care’ instructions) in the rooms of his house in . The works were represented by postcard reproductions by artists such as David, Delacroix, Ingres, and Courbet. The exhibition had an opening ceremony (at which there was an organised discussion on the social

49 Craig Owen, ‘From Work to Frame, or is There Life After “The Death of the Author”?’ in Implosion: Ett Postmodernt Perspectiv / A Postmodern Perspective (Stockholm: Moderna Museet, 1987), p. 208. 50 See Robert Smithson (edited by Bruce Kurz), ‘Conversation with Robert Smithson on April 22nd 1972’ in Nancy Holt (ed), The Writings of Robert Smithson (New York: New York University Press, 1979), p. 200. 51 Roland Barthes, ‘The Death of the Author’ (1967) in Roland Barthes (essays selected and translated by Stephen Heath), Image - Music - Text (New York: Hill and Wang, 1977), pp. 142-148. 52 Owen, p. 208. 104 responsibilities of the artist) and also a closing ceremony. During both ceremonies, a van belonging to an art shipper was parked outside in the street. Owen states that “Broodthaers’s preoccupation with the shell, and not the kernel - the container and not the contained – not only overturns a longstanding philosophical prejudice that meaning and value are intrinsic properties of objects; it also stands as an acknowledgement of the role of the container in determining the shape of what it contains”.53

In his project, Broodthaers, in effect, removed the central core of the exhibition leaving only what might ordinarily be described as the ‘circumtextual’ frame: the building, the crates, the art removals van, the postcard reproductions, the on-site discourse, the opening and closing events, and no doubt a fairly strategic promotional campaign which would have included signage, invitations, press-releases, and some kind of distribution network or mail-out. These things, which are all part-and-parcel of the standard museum experience, prime our approach and mould our expectations of the exhibition to follow - the only difference in Broodthaers’ case being that the framing devices and ‘circumtextual’ features actually constituted the exhibition, rather than mediated it.

Figure 34: Marcel Broodthaers, Musée d’Art Moderne - Département des Aigles - Section XVIIe Siecle (1969), installation view, A 37 90 89, Antwerp, Belgium, 27 September – 4 October 1969.

53 Ibid., p. 208. 105

In another example of the shift of attention from work to frame, Owen discusses Daniel Buren’s installation Within and Beyond the Frame (1973) [Figures 35 and 36] at the John Weber Gallery in New York. With this work Buren strung a series of striped banners down the middle of the gallery (a bit like towels on a washing line) and out of the window across West Broadway. Owen notes how Buren’s undertaking to transgress the frame (one frame anyway: the physical gallery as container) was “engineered to call attention, not to [the work itself], but to the frame”.54

Figure 35: Daniel Buren, Within and Beyond the Frame (1973), installation view, John Weber Gallery, New York.

54 Ibid., p. 209. It is interesting to note that what Owen is describing undermines the traditional code of framing (as discussed previously in this chapter) where it is assumed that the frame is destined, inevitably, to ‘invisibility’. 106

Figure 36: Daniel Buren, Within and Beyond the Frame (1973), installation view, John Weber Gallery, New York.

But are we discussing the frame here, as Owen asserts, or are we discussing context or site?

Owen’s broad configuration of the frame - which is made up of the artwork’s physical, social, economic, and political contexts of production, presentation, and reception, including the zone of interpretation created by the death of the author - is not too dissimilar from recent (equally expansive) formulations of the term ‘site’.

Although written fifteen years later, in her book One Place After Another: Site-Specific Art and Locational Identity (2002), Miwon Kwon states that “the site can now be as various as a billboard, an artistic genre, a disenfranchised community, an institutional framework, a magazine page, a social cause, or a political debate. It can be literal, like a

107 street corner, or virtual, like a theoretical concept”.55 It is quite clear to see that with expanding notions of what constitutes a frame and what qualifies as a site, not to mention the broader term ‘context’ (which ultimately consumes both), a degree of overlap has evidently occurred, at least in the general usage of each term.

Despite a certain amount of interchangeability between the three terms (frame, site and context), it is not productive however to promote too broad a use of one term at the expense of the others, because all, with their respective histories and accumulation of related texts, have something to offer. In the visual arts, analysis of the frame not only centres on the art-frame relationship (the frame’s ‘intracompositionality’, or ‘specificity’ if you prefer) but also, more uniquely, on how the frame has been constructed to mediate the viewer’s experience of the work. Analysis of the site tends to focus more squarely on how the site has influenced the artwork or how the work has been sited and functions within that context. So although there are some general and fairly explicit similarities between the three terms, there are also some quite subtle (but fundamental) differences that either need to be preserved, or indeed, need to be extracted and reasserted.

It is not therefore reliable to assume that literature relating to the art-site relationship is going to be automatically transferable to a discussion on the art-frame relationship - which is unfortunate because ‘site-specificity’ is an area where the shift of focus from artwork to frame/site/context (if we can momentarily use these terms interchangeably) and its/their relevance, has had a significant amount of commentary. For example, the various permutations of site-specificity (such as site-determined, site-orientated, site- referenced, site-conscious, site-responsive and site-related)56 seem at odds with most debates about the frame, not least because, more often than not, artists do not take an existing frame as a starting point for making a work; frames are usually constructed during or added after the creative act. Therefore, any frame which comes into being after the completion of the artwork is automatically excluded from the above site- specificity categories, because these categories all assume either that the site is directly responsible for generating the resultant artwork, or that the work has in some way responded to the site. With frames, this flow of influence is reversed. Rather than the

55 Miwon Kwon, One Place After Another: Site-Specific Art and Locational Identity (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2002), p. 3. 56 Ibid., p. 1. 108 frame dictating an artwork, the frame responds to an artwork. In other words, it is quite common for a contemporary artwork to be conscious of its site or context (‘site- conscious’ or ‘context-sensitive’), but the frame must be conscious of, and responsive to, the work: the site being the place or space that an artwork or event literally takes place, and the frame being the thing attached or created to facilitate, mediate, enhance and/or contain that experience.

Moreover, alternative formulations of ‘specificity’ such as the all-encompassing (but ultimately meaningless) ‘context-specific’ through to the more precise ‘debate-specific’, ‘discourse-specific’ or ‘community-specific’ have almost turned the detection of site- specificity into a futile, if not comical, practice: ‘wall-specific’, ‘southern-hemisphere- specific’, ‘gravity-specific’... Where does the search for specificity end? In addition, the quotation below shows how the debate on ‘site’ (not unlike Owen’s all inclusive portrayal of the frame as discourse and context) has consumed so much that at times it appears to be struggling to move:

... in many projects by artists such as Lothar Baumgarten, Renée Green, Jimmie Durham, and Fred Wilson, the legacies of colonialism, slavery, racism, and the ethnographic tradition as they impact on identity politics have emerged as an important “site” of artistic investigation. In some instances, artists including Green, Silvia Kolbowski, Group Material, Andrea Fraser, and Christian Philipp Muller have reflected on aspects of site-specific practice itself as a “site”, interrogating its currency in relation to aesthetic imperatives, institutional demands, socioeconomic ramifications, or political efficacy. In this way different cultural debates, a theoretical concept, a social issue, a political problem, an institutional framework (not necessarily an art institution), a neighborhood or seasonal event, a historical condition, even particular formations of desire are deemed to function as sites.57

Although I agree that a site (as the space where an artwork is placed or played out) can potentially be anything and everything, this is different to my understanding of a physical frame, which is the material manifestation of an act of framing, and which

57 Ibid., pp. 28-29. 109 exists (or rather, is constructed) to negotiate physical and conceptual space for a specific artwork or set of works.

The fact that art-site debates are not symmetrical to art-frame debates is exactly as it should be. You should be able to discuss an artwork in relation to its site-specificity and then discuss it in relation to its frames (both ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’) and these discussions should be quite different.

Despite some obvious convergences and overlaps (a frame, for example, can be described as being a work’s ‘site’ as well as part of its ‘context of presentation’; and the notion of the ‘site’ as a non-physical, discursive, mobile and intertextually structured space, not necessarily a physical or static one, seems to tread heavily on the toes of some formations of the frame)58 it would be hard to deny that the three terms (site, frame and context) signify differently. If Buren had titled his above mentioned installation Within and Beyond the Site, or Within and Beyond the Context, the result would have been more problematic. I say "more problematic" because Buren’s line of banners never managed to puncture either the ‘institutional’ frame or the ‘circumtextual’ frame, only the ‘architectural/gallery’ frame. Nonetheless, ‘context’ and ‘site’ imply something which is boundless, non-transcendable, and something that is unavoidably present; whereas a frame more readily implies ‘prior’ agency: something which has been constructed.

This latter point is reminiscent of Jonathan Culler’s advocacy of the term ‘framing’ over ‘context’:

But the notion of context frequently oversimplifies rather than enriches discussion, since the opposition between an act and its context seems to presume that the context is given and determines the meaning of the act. We know, of course, that things are not so simple... context is not given but produced; what belongs to a context is determined by interpretive strategies... Yet when we use the term context we slip back into the simple model it proposes. Since the phenomena criticism deals with are signs, forms with socially-constituted meanings, one might try to think not of

58 The concept that the discussion or discourse surrounding an artwork can be its ‘site’, for instance, is similar to Owen’s notion of the interpretative space surrounding an artwork being its frame. 110 context but of the framing of signs... The expression framing the sign has several advantages over context: it reminds us that framing is something we do; it hints of the frame-up (‘falsifying evidence beforehand in order to make someone appear guilty’)... and it eludes the incipient positivism of ‘context’ by alluding to the semiotic function of framing in art, where the frame is determining, setting off the object or event as art...59

Frame (as a term) therefore seems to be particularly appropriate for describing the area surrounding an artwork when it has been specifically constructed with an artwork (or set of artworks) in mind. In other words, when what is being described is the material manifestation of an act (or set of acts) of ‘prior’ framing. For this reason, it makes sense to discuss the mediating/transitional zone created by the distribution and placement of an exhibition’s publicity cards, posters, catalogues, gallery texts and wall labels in terms of being a (‘circumtextual’) frame, because a frame connotes both ‘prior’ and ‘post’ involvement and construction by agents: the artist/frame-maker, and then the viewer.

Alternatively, when considering an artwork which has an outdoor setting or non-art venue, it is often better to describe this as a site because this more readily implies a pre- existing place or space (a beach, a magazine, a radio broadcast etc.) ‘within’ which an artwork appears or happens and which would continue to exist regardless of whether an artwork is placed or occurs ‘within’ it or not.60

So in summary, a ‘site’ can therefore be regarded as the space to which an artwork is ‘added to’, whereas a frame is ‘added to’ the work. The frame can thus be characterised as ‘work sensitive’. And where the term “frame” implies ‘prior’ agency - something which has been constructed - the terms ‘site’ and ‘context’ imply more pre-existing and omnipresent kinds of spaces with connotations of inexhaustibility. As Culler points out, ‘context’ is seen as something ‘given’ which then needs to be extracted from a specific event or set of circumstances for meaning to be possible; however, he notes, “while meaning is context-bound, context is boundless… Contextualization is never

59 Jonathan D. Culler, Framing the Sign: Criticism and its Institutions (Oxford: Blackwell, 1988), p. ix. 60 This is not to suggest that a site would not be altered by the introduction of an artwork. The point I am making here is that a site has a life irrespective of an artwork being placed within it, whereas a frame exists only in response to (or in anticipation of) an artwork. 111 completed; rather one reaches a point where further contextualization seems unproductive”.61

The Artist as Boundary-Maker, and the Perpetual Framing Process.

... by using the technique of ‘cropped’ figures at the edges of the painting, Degas (like Toulouse-Lautrec and Renoir) draws attention to the borders of the frame, thereby giving prominence to framing as an act involving aesthetic choice, not just as a material border. For beyond the frame, it is suggested, extends an artistic continuum, the demarcation of which involves the authoritative exercise of a particular artistic consciousness.62

... the grail of [Allan] Kaprow’s quest - “for a truly participatory art with its sources in everyday experience” - can be approached only by negotiating a frame. If we take these claims for what they are, experience here is understood as an artist, or rather a frame maker, who functions to designate the parameters within which particular moments from the flux of life are isolated and intensified.63

The above quotations bring to mind author G. K. Chesterton’s assertion that “Art is limitation; the essence of every picture is its frame”.64 The notion of art as a process of limitation, a conscious play of selection and rejection, of what to reveal and what to conceal, acknowledges the artist’s requisite role as ‘framer’. However, as if to validate Derrida’s statement, “Il y a du cadre mais le cadre n’existe pas (framing occurs, but there is no frame)”,65 this primordial process of inclusion and exclusion may not necessarily manifest itself in a material frame because the type of framing occurring here has more to do with the defining of edges (the metaphorical edges of an artist’s own practice, the physical composition and perimeter of a particular artwork, the defining of content/meaning etc.) rather than to what is added to an edge in order to reaffirm it. As Culler puts it, “the frame itself may be nothing tangible, pure

61 Culler, p. 148. 62 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 26. 63 John C. Welchman, ‘In and Around the "Second Frame"‘ in Duro, p. 209. 64 Chesterton is quoted by Brettell in Brettell and Starling, p. 20. 65 Jacques Derrida, La Verite en Peinture (Paris: Flammarion, 1978), p. 83. 112 articulation”.66 This framing process involves the staking out of an artist’s physical and conceptual territory, a prior determining of what should be invited ‘in’ and what should be left ‘out’. Framing therefore occurs through a process of delimitation, an edge is created or implied, and a physical frame in some shape or form will usually follow at a later stage in order for the determined boundaries to be asserted. The edge (or boundary) can be regarded then as a frame without mass; and when material substance is added to articulate that edge, then a physical frame is formed. The frame is thus, as Maclachlan and Reid state, “a material reinforcement of [the] edge”.67

When we look at Damien Hirst’s A Thousand Years (1990) [Figure 3], essentially what we are seeing is the compression and framing of what ordinarily happens in the world beyond the edge of the artwork’s glass tank. Dead bodies rot, maggots hatch, flies are attracted to insect-o-cutors and get zapped. In short, beings are born and then they die. However, what makes A Thousand Years compelling is the presentation of these events before us and the accessibility of life’s cycle through the process of framing. The frame creates the focal point, it contains the work and allows it to function. Without the glass container, without the physical articulation of the work’s edge, A Thousand Years would dissipate into the ‘outside’ world, where the effect would be diluted to the point of being lost.

Delimitation is evident throughout the act of artistic creation, not only at the laboratory stages of production where artists start the ongoing selection (and rejection) process of what to pull into their practices (materials, concepts, themes, issues, debates etc.), but also at the sharper end of production where the decision needs to be made as to what to expose to an audience (not only which artwork, but also where the cut-off point for that work is: working drawings, preparatory photographs, documentation, ephemera collected along the way).

The question of not ‘what’ to show, but ‘how’ to show it, further extends the framing process, pushing the operation again in a material direction. It is this aspect of framing (the staging, exhibition design, and the promotion of ideas through ‘circumtextual’ matter) that directs and instructs the viewer how to approach an artwork, what they

66 Culler, p. ix. 67 Maclachlan and Reid, p. 23. 113 should look at, and which, hopefully, facilitates an appropriate response to a work. In other words: how an artwork negotiates a conceptual space for itself depends, at least in part, on how it negotiates a physical space for itself.

The latter stages of the framing process (both physical and metaphorical), however, slip in and out of an artist’s control. Once an artwork is incorporated into a museum exhibition, a biennale, or a major collection, it is exposed to another level of ‘institutional’ framing, which itself attempts to influence contemporary taste by controlling what gets seen and how it gets seen. The artwork is usually framed by an abundance of promotional and critical literature, all of which stake out and contest the artist’s aesthetic ground and main themes. It is in such discourse that the edges implied and asserted by an artist can be destabilised, and he or she may attempt to prolong control of these edges through a process of supplementation. This can manifest itself in many ways including artist statements, gallery floor talks, and artist lectures, as well as by the artist exercising more influence on the ‘immediate’ framing of an artwork, or on the design of an exhibition within which their work is to be encountered. The need to supplement an artwork is explained by Pearson below:

The completed composition fails to signify adequately the artist’s active, perceiving consciousness, precisely because it is completed - no longer involved in the artist’s process of creation - and therefore the artist is an absent signified, a ghost that haunts the margins of the composition. The consciousness that creates the picture and identifies its limitations attempts to survive death-by-completion through the logic of supplementality.68

Pearson notes how both Georges Seurat and author Henry James attempt to survive death-by-completion by representing their artistic consciousness in the frame (Seurat in his pointillist borders, and James through his prefaces) thereby reaffirming their authority over their work and attuning the viewer’s/reader’s understanding of the limits of their respective artistic domains:

68 Pearson, p. 22. 114 ... for James the role of the artist is to circumscribe an area within the panorama of esthetic space. To James, “really, universally, relations stop nowhere, and the exquisite problem of the artist is eternally but to draw, by a geometry of his own, the circle within which they shall happily appear to do so” (1: v). The circle, the frame around the novel or tale, is that exquisite, eternal sign of the artist, to whom the frame represents the “geometry of his own” - his esthetic domain and so, as an artist, his very identity. As a manifestation of artistic (authorial) consciousness, the composition reflects the powers of the artist.69

So although the process of delimitation is evident, crucial in fact, at the point of an artwork’s inception (being essential in determining both the work and the artist’s “very identity”), the framing process continues through to ‘what to show’ and ‘how to show it’ - the latter (depending on the artist and situation) being an ongoing process. Resistance to death-by-completion can thereby be found in the frame which attempts to extend and reaffirm artistic consciousness, and within the manipulation of the elements which go to make up that frame. Because although the edge can act as “umpire” deciding what is ‘in’ and what is ‘out’,70 on its own (without the help of a frame) the edge may have difficulty asserting itself.

… these frames demark, as do all property lines (and city walls), a recognizable, verifiable border, which is presumably drawn according to some logic inherent in the difference between art and the world - a difference which, without the frame, would still somehow distinguish the two realms, though would not ensure the freedom of either realm from intrusion of the other.71

69 Ibid., pp. 26-27. 70 See O’Doherty (1986), p. 20. 71 Pearson, p. 17. 115

Art and Life (a Blurring of Boundaries).

In what may come to be seen as the most apt and prophetic description of modern art ever uttered, Robert Rauschenberg once stated that he worked “in the gap between art and life”. Throughout the modern era, in ways too numerous and obvious to outline, artists have repeatedly evinced discomfort and outright dissatisfaction with the limits of art as given by historical precedents, limits which denied the material of life. Their responses have ranged from anti-art sentiments, via efforts by which the literal framing and segregating apparatus of art are removed, to the simple desire to create a

more inclusive form of art, namely one that takes “life” into account.72

The ‘institutional’ frame became symbolic, particularly in the 1970s, as the thing which most needed to be critiqued and transgressed in order for art to have a greater relevance outside of (the institution of) art itself. Through the probing of this frame - Kosuth’s ‘Second’ frame - artists aimed to position themselves closer to the audience/community and everyday life, leading to an art activity which was less mediated by existing codes and conventions, and more socially integrated; thus resulting in a blurring of boundaries between art and life.73

The push for an art form which is more accessible and responsive to everyday life has manifested itself in a proliferation of site-orientated artworks and contemporary art installations which are barely distinguishable from the quotidian world and life itself.

... a dominant drive of site-oriented practices today is the pursuit of a more intense engagement with the outside world and everyday life - a critique of culture that is inclusive of nonart spaces, nonart institutions, and nonart

issues (blurring the difference between art and nonart, in fact).74

72 Mark Rosenthal, Understanding Installation Art: From Duchamp to Holzer (New York: Prestel, 2003), p. 26. 73 Allan Kaprow’s ‘non-art’ or ‘life-like’ works are prime examples of the conflation between life experience and art experience, see his Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life / Allan Kaprow (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 2003). 74 Kwon, p. 24. 116 The aspiration of the modern installation artist became in large part how to reflect the experience of life - its complex issues, aspects, and appearances. The technique of installation has proved to be a useful tool by which to rhetorically speak about and investigate life. Thus, whereas Rauschenberg works in the “gap”, the installation artist may attempt a rapprochement encompassing both art and life.75

As Rosenthal claims, installation art is better able to represent the complexities of contemporary experience than painting or sculpture, because installation art incorporates a more life-like experience of time and space. The viewer, Rosenthal states, “is asked to investigate the work of art much as he or she might explore some phenomenon in life, making one’s way through actual space and time in order to gain knowledge… The viewer is in the present, experiencing temporal flow and spatial awareness. The time and space of the viewer coincide with the art, with no separation or dichotomy between the perceiver and the object. In other words, life pervades this form of art”.76

The dynamic of much contemporary art relies on this blurring of boundaries between art and life. For example, in Point of View (2002) [Figures 37, 38 and 39] Dutch artist Germaine Kruip introduced a number of actors to the streets of Tucuman, Argentina, where they played the parts of local residents and passers-by.77 Although this intervention in public space was publicised in advance, the identities of the actors (and their intended locations) were not, inveigling the work’s ‘viewers’ in what Tom Morton describes as “a gummy web of suspicion and doubt”.78 For the people of Tucuman who engaged with this work, there was no guarantee that they would actually see an actor, and no confirmation if they in fact did. The work was therefore played out largely in the minds and imaginations of those who were aware of it.

75 Rosenthal, pp. 26-27. 76 Ibid., p. 27. 77 Point of View was performed in Tucuman by local theatre group La Baulera. It had previously been performed in Amsterdam and Oslo. 78 Tom Morton, ‘Germaine Kruip: Shooting stars, passers-by and the view from a window’ in Frieze (Issue 92, 2005), p. 149. 117

Figures 37, 38 and 39: Germaine Kruip, Point of View (2002), San Miguel de Tucuman, Argentina.

However, if art is not something separate (or to be separated) from the world, but is something boundless and continuous with the world which, after experiencing directly or discursively, we carry around in our heads rather than look at in a gallery, then framing can be viewed as a necessary facilitator which enables an artwork to be placed within an audience’s consciousness - especially as art, and as something worth thinking about. This leads to a crucial point which at first seems to reverse the logic of the art/life boundary disintegration, this point being: that as art becomes more life-like, effectively 118 becoming harder to recognise, the need for framing increases. For it stands to reason that without sufficient framing, the effect of Point of View would have been minimal: without the advance publicity, without the assertion that this was a work of art, and without the subsequent commentary and art reviews, Kruip’s piece would have been contained within a tight network of those in the know.

Martha Buskirk stresses that “when works of art are made using forms close to or identical with the realm of objects not defined as art, the designation of [artistic] authorship may in fact be the only feature that distinguishes the work of art from any other object”.79 This point further emphasises the importance of framing, because without adequate framing, designation of authorship can not be asserted: an artwork’s ‘certificate of authenticity’, for example, being one such framing device for designating authorship as well as for defining the nature and boundaries of an artwork.

Where the traditional frame might previously have been seen as a kind of barrier between the distinct realms of art and life, when art pervades life (as in Kruip’s case) the frame is more integrated and covert. It functions to highlight an aspect of life against a backdrop of life in general. In other words, the frame acts to separate (or more accurately ‘elevate’) like from like, life from life.

I hesitate to say that the frame acts to ‘separate’, because without the necessary elaboration this tends to perpetuate a common misconception about the function of a frame and the task of framing. Just as framing throughout history has attempted to separate and bind artworks from and to their surroundings, so too do contemporary frames. A frame therefore should elevate a work enough for it to be noticed as significant, but it must also bind the work to contexts which are significant to how the work will be interpreted. With regard to contemporary art, framing should thus be thought of as a process of positioning art within life, not sectioning it off from life. And the role of the frame in this should be approached not as one of referee between two opponents, but as one of pacifier and creator of harmonic space within one unitary inter- related whole.

79 Martha Buskirk, The Contingent Object of Contemporary Art (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003), p. 15. 119 This is true for both ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ frames:

If you want to be a curator, the important thing is to have a life relationship with art, to be able to connect art and real life together. It’s about trying to create an in-between space between two realities. I don’t know if we should call it curating or not. I think making an exhibition is only an enlarged moment in the process of living. It is like taking a microscope and looking at a virus and blowing it up, but the virus continues to live and die. The process continues.80

The connecting function of Hanru’s “in-between space” - his ‘curatorial’ frame, if you like - reasserts that framing should not merely try to section art off from life, but must attempt to highlight and mediate one thing (or set of things) with respect to another thing (or set of things).

Regarding exhibition design, David Dernie notes that the best contemporary exhibition design invents “resonant connections between the subject matter of the exhibition experience and today’s world”.81

The notion that ‘life-like’ artworks and so-called ‘boundless’ artworks need to be framed in order to exist in the consciousness of a broad audience exposes the artist’s paradoxical relationship to the frame. Because although artists seem to have a natural desire, mission even, to question boundaries and break beyond any parameters which are either self-imposed or externally imposed upon them (transgression being seen as crucial not only for the continued advancement of their individual practices, but also for a continued sense of freedom within and advancement of art itself), at the same time, artists are directly implicated in the delimitation and framing of their own work. Therefore, the role of artist as ‘frame-breaker’ and artist as ‘frame-maker’ run concurrent.

80 Hou Hanru in interview with Paul O’Neill in Paul O’Neill, ‘Hou Hanru’ in Contemporary 21 (Issue 77, 2005), p. 65. 81 David Dernie, Exhibition Design (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2006), p. 17. 120 This echoes John Welchman’s assertion that “practitioners of the neo-avant-garde took on a double destiny as necessary transgressionists and guardians of the frame”.82 Thus, whilst in the position of trying to connect art to everyday life in order to make it more participatory, democratic and relevant beyond the gallery (which was to be achieved through the transgression of existing art systems and conventional definitions of art), artists were also in the position of having to protect art as a space which could allow for such creative and cerebral activity to take place.

In many senses the question of the frame never disappears in the postwar period, though it is continuously delivered to new circumferences and supplied with fresh parameters… It can be argued fairly that the most powerful moment of postwar transgressivism is associated with movements on both sides of the Atlantic that from the late 1950s forward challenged many of the conventional parameters that were assumed in the definition of an artwork. Allan Kaprow in New York, and somewhat later (and differently) Joseph Beuys in Dusseldorf, negotiated a thoroughgoing (if not necessarily consistent or even original) dispute with the construction and signification of visual practice… As both these “artists” noted frequently in their writings, “happenings,” “actions,” lectures and performances, the cumulative effect of their proposed disruptions was a radical deframement of art such that it was variously opened up to everyday life ... to what Kaprow discussed under the term “experience,” and Beuys envisioned as a new “social concept of art”... The cluster attitudes toward the deframing of art taken on by Kaprow, Beuys, and their successors (and antagonists) encloses one of the fullest sets of “parergonist” expansions in and around the Western (Euro-American) postwar artworld... In their different ways, however, most of these gestures participate in what is an almost choric articulation of a transvisual para-art that simultaneously courts the dissolution of the material and delivery of traditional art, but that, at the same time, is still unevenly bound by the concept of the frame.83

82 Welchman in Duro, p. 206. 83 Ibid., pp. 206-207. 121 Installation Art, the ‘Circumtextual’ Frame, and the Fallacy of the Frameless Artwork.

Installation refers to a dedicated space in which one artistic vision or aura is at work, setting forth various kinds of phenomena. An installation may be defined as anything the artist wants to do when given a room in which to work, a definition that deliberately creates a broad swath of possibilities. In an installation there is unlikely to be a single object, but an assemblage, attached or not. Conversely, an installation may consist of no objects at all but a spatial experience, not unlike an architectural manifestation. Regardless, the viewer is usually in an enclosed space, swept up in a work of art much larger in expanse than an individual object can normally

create.84

Although a large proportion of contemporary art installations happen within an enclosed space (as pointed out by Rosenthal above) the artist is by no means restricted to a room or gallery. There are numerous examples of installations and site-specific artworks which extend beyond the gallery - such as Daniel Buren’s Within and Beyond the Frame (1973) [Figures 35 and 36] - or which have an outdoor location away from a gallery or (art) institutional building altogether: Walter De Maria’s The Lightning Field (1977) [Figure 40] and Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s The Gates, Central Park, New York (1979-2005) being two well known examples of this.

84 Rosenthal, p. 26. 122

Figure 40: Walter De Maria, The Lightning Field (1977), situated in a remote area of the high desert of New Mexico, it comprises 400 steel poles installed in a grid measuring one mile by one kilometer.

In his book Understanding Installation Art (2003) Rosenthal claims that installation is an "unframed form of art".85 His position seems to go beyond the assertion that with installation art there is no frame separating the viewer from the artwork, it also suggests that there are no frames separating the artwork from (or binding it to) actual life.86 Although with gallery-based installations this is clearly not the case, with open site installations, physical frames are less pronounced, but they can still be identified. Rosenthal’s notion of a frameless artwork noticeably ignores the framing processes that artists and art institutions are continually engaged in, and the question of how framing physically manifests itself is never addressed. The artwork, so Rosenthal’s text leads us to believe, is left to negotiate its own space.

For an artwork which is sited or happens in a remote location, framing is essential for drawing attention to the work. The resulting frames allow the work to be noticed and facilitate its contemplation by providing appropriate physical and conceptual space. These frames mediate the art experience, promoting and conveying meaning to an audience through ‘circumtext’. To re-quote Duro, they “create a space for the artwork that the work in itself is incapable of furnishing”.87

85 Ibid., p. 27. 86 Ibid., pp. 26-27. 87 Duro, p. 1. 123 I will focus for the moment on a specific type of ‘circumtextual’ frame - touched upon earlier in this chapter - which is made up of peripheral physical features such as information handouts, invitation cards, artist statements, exhibition catalogues, posters, text panels, and press-releases. All of which (collectively) form a physical but porous and shifting frame around the work. Essentially, this frame fulfills a similar mediating function to any other physical frame throughout history. However, the notion of the frame as cellular, discursive and mobile breaks the assumption of solidity, rectilinearity and stasis which has constrained traditional configurations of the frame. Rather than an impervious membrane restricting direct access to an artwork, the frame is reconfigured here as a shifting zone of elements or ‘frame particles’, a threshold, through which one must pass to reach the work - with each route through being unique. And rather than being passive, this frame (which can be described as part promotional, part rationale) actively hunts out its audience via databases, mail-outs and other distributive networks.

The rambling, amorphous, and evolving nature of this type of ‘circumtextual’ frame - as well as possible conflicts of interest between the various parties involved in creating it - compounds the frame’s uncontrollability and leads to a situation where, despite its inexact location and hazy edge, border tensions can still exist; the frame continues therefore to be a contested space.

These subtle struggles for control of the frame between artist, curator, institution and/or gallerist can develop due to differing ideas on how best to represent a (body of) work, with each approach having the potential to significantly prime and shape audience/critic response. Inevitably, artists wishing to obtain, maintain, or regain control of this area of the ‘circumtextual’ frame have made inroads into this territory by directing or overseeing the content, design and production of publicity cards, posters and catalogues. On certain occasions, artists have incorporated these activities into their art practices either as supplementary elements or as works in their own right. The ‘circumtextual’ frame can thus be ‘intracompositional’.

The London-based art-collective BANK (1991-1999) were always clear about the importance of creating the right impression through strategic self-promotional campaigns. Describing the approach for their first exhibition titled BANK (a title which stuck and became the name of the group) in a disused building in New Cross, London, they have written: 124

The BANK invitation was silk-screened onto sponge-foam and various vegetables were window-boxed and sent to critics, which worked surprisingly well. All of this was an early, positive lesson in attention- seeking self-promotion. It was something we got better and better at over the years. And as we weren’t interested in the standard invite cards, making invitations became just as much a part of the shows as anything else.88

Even prior to this 1991 exhibition, BANK members John Russell and Simon Bedwell conducted a number of ‘fictional’ shows which existed only in the form of mail-outs. Invitation cards were sent out to one hundred or so people from a mailing list; the idea being that “it didn’t matter if you were actually having shows so long as people thought you were”.89

The harnessing of the ‘circumtextual’ frame can also be seen in the practice of London- based art collective FlatPack001 whose work draws upon artistic, curatorial and architectural impulses in order to assess “the viability of producing an accessible and challenging alternative to the static gallery space and develop a versatile, mobile conceptual structure that responds to the individual needs of artist, audience and location”.90 For The seat with the clearest view, which was an exhibition of UK-based artists held at GREY MATTER in Sydney in 2001, FlatPack001 designed and hand- painted a number of exhibition posters [Figure 41] which were displayed around Sydney (in art bookshops, on gallery notice-boards etc.) to promote the exhibition. Each uniquely designed and personally rendered poster/artwork created a blurred edge between exhibition and non-exhibition, intra-artistic space and extra-artistic space, and therefore artwork and (‘circumtextual’) frame. These posters accompanied FlatPack001’s other component work Prepare for Impact/Drop (2001) which required the gallery to act as both an actual and hypothetical ‘drop zone’ for the artworks in the exhibition. To facilitate and ease this drop of art from one cultural context to another, FlatPack001 custom-made a parachute which also doubled as a ‘flyer’ (complete with exhibition information) and an invitation to potential gallery visitors in Sydney. During

88 BANK, BANK (London: Black Dog Publishing, 2000), p. 5. 89 Ibid., p. 4. 90 See Grey Matter Contemporary Art, The seat with the clearest view (Sydney: Grey Matter Contemporary Art, press-release, 13 January - 4 February 2001). 125 the exhibition the parachute was draped along a wall just inside the gallery entrance [see Figures 42 and 43] asserting rather than doubting its ‘intracompositionality’ with regard to the rest of the show.

Figure 41: Detail from a series of individually designed, titled, and hand-painted posters by FlatPack001 for the room with the clearest view exhibition at Grey Matter Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2001.

126

Figure 42: FlatPack001, Drop (2001), rip stop nylon, thread, and ink, 4080 x 1500 mm (eight-paneled parachute), installation dimensions variable.

Figure 43: FlatPack001, Drop (2001) (detail). 127 Other artists critically engaged with promotion and the production of exhibition cards, posters and catalogues are Pae White and Matthew Brannon. Both again blur the line between interiority and exteriority, art and design. New York-based Brannon nullifies the acquired sense of control usually associated with ‘intracompositional’ framing by immediately relinquishing control of the design and format for his own exhibition announcement cards and promotional material to other artists (the only stipulation being that the textual information - exhibition title, dates, location etc. - be correct). This has resulted in artists such as and Sarah Morris rather confusingly using images of their own work to promote Brannon’s exhibitions [see Figure 44].91

Figure 44: Poster designed by Liam Gillick for Matthew Brannon’s Penetration exhibition at Jan Winkelmann, Berlin, 2005.

91 Brannon discusses this aspect of his practice in conversation with Roger White at http://www.thebrooklynrail.org/arts/april04/brannon.html [15 October 2006]. Also refer to the online press-releases for Brannon’s solo exhibitions at Jan Winkelmann, Berlin: http://www.janwinkelmann.com/05_MB.html and http://www.janwinkelmann.com/06_MB.html [15 October 2006]. 128 A recent collaborative text project between Sydney-based artist Michael Lindeman and myself provides a further example of this critical colonisation of the ‘circumtextual’ frame. For this project, Lindeman asked me to write a gallery text to accompany his solo exhibition Streetscape at Sherman Galleries, Sydney, in 2006. I suggested writing an exhibition review which would be made available as an A4 take-away sheet at the point of exhibition, thus short-circuiting the usual process and order of art criticism, and fast-tracking discourse. In the name of conceptual accuracy, this ‘instant review’ (which was produced in the format of a generic art magazine page, complete with text columns, installation image, fictional page number and issue details) required both the artist and gallery to surrender control over the content of the text - control being a fundamental difference between an ‘in-house’ gallery text and an external review.

With such blurring tactics at play in contemporary art practices it is difficult at times to draw a neat and definitive line between what forms part of an artwork/exhibition and what does not, even in a non-Derridean sense. As MacLachlan and Reid point out with regard to traditional narrative written texts which start with ‘Once upon a time’ and finish with ‘The End’, difficulty arises when you are asked to consider whether these framing and containment devices form part of the ‘circumtext’ or part of the main text.92

Border tensions created by the conflicting interests and various responsibilities of the parties involved in the framing of an artwork could be said, however, to demarcate an edge of sorts, a contested interface, be it one possibly in a state of flux. For these types of conflicts can only really happen at the edge of an artist’s work or practice because interference at any other stage by an outside body (curator/institution) would be seen as artistic encroachment.

In light of this expanded view of the physical frame, the assertion that an artwork can be frameless seems (at best) incomplete, or (at worst) incorrect. Not only does it show an avoidance or a misunderstanding of the role played by ‘extended’ frames, it also exposes a failure to reconfigure the frame at the same rate as the development and reconfiguration of new art forms. It is here that the neglect of framing theory and the

92 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 96. A similar ambiguity between ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ can be identified in movies in DVD format: to what extent, one could ask, do the deleted scenes, alternative endings, and actor interviews form part of the movie? 129 workings of the contemporary frame become apparent - especially in comparison to the colossal amount of research and debate relating to the contemporary notion and understanding of ‘site’.

The notion of the ‘boundless’ artwork further complicates issues, because the implication is that if an artwork is boundless, and therefore ‘edgeless’, how can it have a circumnavigating frame? The quick answer is that a frame can sit within the ‘boundary’ of an artwork, and can be perforated and penetrable; however to supplement this answer, I would also like to probe the notion of the physically ‘boundless’ artwork a bit more here. If we take Walter De Maria’s The Lightning Field (1977) [Figure 40] as a test case (which due to its open site location and its incorporation of particular weather patterns is often cited as a ‘boundless’ artwork of note) and we question whether or not we would still be within reach of this artwork, or could still experience it, if we were to stand in a street in New York, it becomes clear that claims of ‘boundlessness’ are as complex (and demarcation lines as blurred) as when dealing with the issue of ‘parergonality’. For it would not be an outrageous answer to say that "no" we would not be within reach of The Lightning Field because we would clearly be outside of the artwork’s zone of direct experience.93 The fact that weather happens in New York as well as in the New Mexico desert (and global weather patterns are inextricably connected), does not forge a strong enough link for us to be able to claim that we could see or experience De Maria’s work whilst standing in New York. To experience The Lightning Field first hand, we would obviously have to make the trip to the desert.

Also testing The Lightning Field’s ‘boundless’ status are its internal framing mechanisms and containment lines: the most obvious being the use of ‘field’ (in both its title and form) which strongly connotes enclosure. And contrary to the romantic fictional manifestation of the desert as an endless expanse of sand, the desert is far from boundless.

93 It could be countered that De Maria’s The Lightning Field can be experienced discursively in book or magazine articles, conversations, lectures, emails etc. This, however, is true for all artworks, but few would claim that Edvard Munch’s The Scream (1893), for example, or Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907) are frameless or without boundary, despite being the subjects of countless reproductions. 130 Theories relating to the functions of the tourist ‘marker’ are also relevant here if we replace the word ‘tourist’ for ‘art’. According to Dean MacCannell in The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class (1976), a ‘marker’ is anything (or any information) which ‘frames’ something as a tourist ‘sight’, such as a guidebook, an informational plaque, a slide-show, a signpost, a brochure, a souvenir etc.94 “Like other frames, the marker thus constitutes a particular field for special attention as well as guiding the tourist’s view of it”.95 Other ‘markers’ which might semiotically mediate our experience of open site artworks could include viewing decks and strategically positioned seating. Again this breaks the mindset that a frame is necessarily a transportable and impermeable membrane which circumnavigates the periphery of an artwork.

MacLachlan and Reid quote John Frow in stating that “any aesthetic object or process will tend to be defined by a particular configuration of framings”96 - being encoded during ‘prior’ framing and subsequently decoded through ‘post’ framing. MacLachlan and Reid continue:

Many common socio-cultural practices could be similarly defined. Take, for example, the gynaecological examination. Such occasions clearly involve ‘a particular configuration of framings’ so that the exposing of one’s sexual organs to what might be a perfect stranger is clearly understood by all parties to be a medical rather than an erotic encounter. Constraints such as the setting in which such examinations take place (usually in a room separate from the room in which the doctor and patient meet and discuss any problems), who is permitted to take part in the examination, the topics which can be discussed, the kind of language used and other non-verbal gestures are all part of a standardised set of procedures to ensure that misinterpretation does not occur.97

94 See Dean MacCannell, The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class (New York: Schocken, 1976), p. 41. 95 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 114. 96 See John Frow, Marxism and Literary History (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986), p. 220; and MacLachlan and Reid, p. 13. 97 MacLachlan and Reid, p. 13. MacLachlan and Reid are drawing on a similar example in Norman Fairclough’s Language and Power (London: Longman, 1989). 131 In the contemporary visual arts, when an artwork lacks sufficient (prior) framing and the necessary frames are either not in place, start to break down, or are missed, then misinterpretation and confusion are inevitable. For example, one Saturday morning in 1993, I visited a group exhibition at ’s Factual Nonsense gallery in London which featured artists such as Gary Hume, and David Taborn. I walked around the gallery looking at the artworks and was just about to make my exit when Joshua Compston asked me if I wanted to see the video installation. I said “ok” and he walked over to his desk and got some keys. He then asked me to follow him as he walked out of the gallery’s front door (locking it as we left) and across the street into another building. After ascending a set of stairs, I found myself in an apartment where a women in her early twenties, wearing pajamas, was sitting on a sofa watching TV. Compston mentioned to her that I wanted to see the video and he put a cassette in the VCR. The woman invited me, in a broad American accent, to take a seat on the sofa and watch it. The video started to play and it featured the young woman on the sofa reciting a stream of anecdotes. At the same time, the woman turned to me and started reciting similar anecdotes about parties at her parents house and being grounded for being drunk etc. At this stage, sensing my slight unease, Compston produced a press-release and passed it to me. It was here that I discovered that the woman was Leila Sadeghee and I was in the middle of her work ERRATA:

“ERRATA” will consist of a confessional style video dialogue/conversation, spoken to the camera as if in rap with an imaginary friend, wearing the different guises of her past self and concentrating on different aspects of the post war High-Kitsch of glorious sub utopia that she had a continual direct coating of until she arrived in this country 2 months ago. Throughout the large 900 sq ft room in which she lives will be various objects associated with her past, in addition to herself, who will alternate between a state of acting out the past (as in the video) and as she is now, distanced and able to accept the consequences of the pursuit of dreams other than the ‘American Dream’, and thereby able to inform the audience of her state of grace now, in addition to being able to accept interviews from the general public on aspects of teenage life in America today.98

98 Factual Nonsense, Leila Sadeghee - ERRATA (London: Factual Nonsense, press-release, 26 November - 17 December 1993). 132 Having been whisked from a conventional gallery setting (where video art is usually far less confronting) the experience was so disorientating that art and life teetered on a knife edge. Prior to the prompts provided by the press-release, there was simply no way of knowing the parameters of the work or how I was supposed to watch, engage or interact with it. Was I expected to watch the whole video? Would it be rude to leave after only a few minutes? To what extent was it acceptable for me to explore the apartment? Would I be interfering with a ‘performance’ by asking questions?

The promotional and mediating aspect of framing discussed above, along with the realisation that artworks and experiences always present themselves to us ‘prior’ framed, leads us back to the paradoxical concept that once a ‘boundless’ artwork has been created, it still needs to be framed. Because without such framing, nobody will know that they have to go to the middle of the New Mexico desert to see Walter De Maria’s The Lightning Field, nobody will know that Allan Kaprow brushing his teeth is meant to be interpreted cerebrally as ‘non-art’, and nobody will hypothesise that the person next to them in the queue for a newspaper in Tucuman, Argentina, might be an actor in an artwork by Germaine Kruip. It is important to remember that, more often than not, we are made aware of these and similar art activities and interventions not through their placement or siting, but through their framing. Otherwise, we can only hope to inadvertently stumble across such site-works and desert activities whilst physically within their zones of contact.

133 Chapter 3: Contemporary Incarnations of the

‘Immediate’ Physical Frame.

Darbyshire Framemakers.

These days, art may come in myriad forms, but how it is framed and presented is as important as ever. For today’s artists the frame is more than a finishing touch, it is a crucial part of the work itself. This applies equally to ’ tough-girl self-portrait encased in industrial MDF; the vast Perspex frame for Sam Taylor-Wood’s four-metre-long photograph Wrecked (1996); or Tracey Emin’s shrine-like arrangement of tiny, blue- sprayed votive receptacles that contained her teeth, diary pages, medical reports and IUD in the ’s Minky Manky exhibition in 1995. All of the above were produced by Mark Darbyshire who custom- makes frames, cases and even furniture for artists ranging from and Antony Gormley to Damien Hirst and .1

On the website for Darbyshire Framemakers there is a selected archive of past framing projects. It lists the requirements of various clients and the framing solutions offered by Darbyshire. Below, I look at two of these projects.

Project 1: Settings & Players - Theatrical Ambiguity in American Photography was an exhibition of American artists spanning four decades held at White Cube, London, in 2001. The show looked at “notions of reality and staging in photography and how work presented as documents of daily life is shrouded in theatrical ambiguity”. Curated by Louise Neri and Vince Aletti, the exhibition line-up included many influential artists such as Diane Arbus and William Eggleston, as well as then up-and-coming artists such as Anna Gaskell and Collier Schorr.2

1 , Moving Targets: A Users Guide to British Art Now (London: Tate Gallery Publishing, 1997), p. 132. Mark Darbyshire is the founder of Darbyshire Framemakers. 2 http://www.darbyshire.uk.com/pages/page.aspx?pageId=20 [30 April 2007]. 134

Requirement: Around 45 separate photo works, all arriving unframed from the US. Size of photographs images varied from 30x40cm to 150x180cm.

Solution: Although framing was mostly to specifications provided, the over all [sic] look of the exhibition needed to be taken into consideration, with variation in the framing but not so much as to create a confusion of styles. The framing included sprayed white box frames float mounted, American black walnut clear lacquer finish with Canson window mount, and semi- transparent white over-spray on maple.3

The fact that the works for Settings & Players arrived ‘unframed’ from the US, and that there was sufficient leeway within the framing specifications for Darbyshire to consider the overall look of the exhibition, is an initial indication that the added frames are ‘disengaged’. The avoidance of a “confusion of styles” allowed the photographic images to take ‘centre-stage’ without drawing attention to the frames, whilst the subtle variation in frame styles allowed the photographs to be grouped as necessary in matching frames. This can be seen in the documentation images of the installed exhibition [see Figures 45 - 47].

Figure 45: Settings & Players (2001), curated by Louise Neri and Vince Aletti, installation view, White Cube, London.

3 http://www.darbyshire.uk.com/pages/page.aspx?pageId=20 [30 April 2007]. 135

Figures 46 and 47: Settings & Players (2001), installation view, White Cube, London.

136 Although Darbyshire’s mention of pre-set framing specifications points to an involvement by the participating artists (and/or their galleries) in the framing of their artworks, it is difficult to ascertain from this exactly how involved each artist was in the way their works were eventually framed.4 Even if some of the artists in Settings & Players were happy to delegate control of the exact frame specifications, this would not necessarily alter their status as ‘disengaged’ frames, because both ‘post-production’ and artist-controlled frames can be ‘disengaged’.5

The solution to group frame styles according to artist and series, allowed for a slight variation in framing without compromising the consistency and rhythm of the exhibition as a whole. The uniformity achieved through the grouping of identical framing styles allowed each photograph within each group to assert itself without the clash and ‘noise’ of competing frames, whilst the variation between each frame group functioned effectively to demarcate different artists and series. This variation also allowed each framing decision to be more responsive to the variety of each artist’s work, and differences between artist, work size, work type and content could be respected.

Despite the seemingly varied frame specifications listed by Darbyshire (“sprayed white box frames float mounted, American black walnut clear lacquer finish with Canson window mount, and semi-transparent white over-spray on maple”), these in fact read like an inventory of contemporary ‘gallery-style’ frames which do not stray too far from a ‘white cube’ reductionist sensibility.

Another indicator that the frames for Settings & Players were intended to function in a ‘disengaged’ manner is that the exhibition was regarded and marketed as an ‘exhibition of photographs’: although the frames facilitated the experience of the exhibition, visitors encountered them as a consequence of viewing the photographs, the frames were never the main focus of attention. The ‘immediate’ frames thus functioned in much the same way as the ‘extended’ gallery setting: the dynamic of the work being found within the photographic images, rather than in the physical surrounds.6

4 Despite efforts to obtain this information from Darbyshire Framemakers during a visit to their London workshop in December 2005, and later via email, records of this were unavailable. 5 Refer back to my diagram on page 9. 6 In this chapter, I occasionally comment on ‘extended’ settings/frames, but only in relation to the function of ‘immediate’ frames. 137 Project 2: Fat-Bottomed Girls was a solo exhibition of new drawings by Julie Verhoeven held at Mobile Home, London, in 2002. It consisted of 40 works which depicted 40 of Verhoeven’s all-time favourite pop songs such as Orgasm Addict by the Buzzcocks, Xanadu by Olivia Newton John, All I Want is You by Roxy Music, as well as 37 others. The works ranged from mixed media collage to pencil and acrylic on canvas. Verhoeven - who usually draws to music - is one of the UK’s leading illustrators and is a regular contributor to magazines such as Dazed & Confused and The Face. She is also a fashion consultant and has directed and animated music for groups such as the Sugarbabes.

Requirement: 40 drawings of various styles all requiring a different style of frame.

Solution: Mounting was a mixture of float and window-mount. Darbyshire selected a range of frames from hand-gessoed and waxed, gold gilt, and pre-finished patterned mouldings. The over-all [sic] effect once installed, as directed by Verhoeven, was a psychedelic grotto, ideally complimenting [sic] the trashy pop paraphernalia the artist also had on display.7

In contrast to the fairly refined ‘gallery-style’ framing and grouped uniformity of Settings & Players, the framing for the Fat-Bottomed Girls exhibition was self- consciously eclectic and unrestrained [see Figures 48 and 49].

7 http://www.darbyshire.uk.com/pages/page.aspx?pageId=50 [30 April 2007]. 138

Figures 48 and 49: Julie Verhoeven, Fat-Bottomed Girls (2002), installation view, Mobile Home, London.

139 We know that for this exhibition the exact frame specifications were decided upon after the drawings were completed. We also know that the frames do not all abide by contemporary ‘gallery-style’ framing conventions and at times stray into the realm of ‘High Street-style’ framing and the “pre-finished patterned mouldings” of the local custom framer. This indicates that the frames are ‘supplementary’ and have something more unusual to say about their relationship to the drawings than a ‘disengaged’ frame might. The non-uniformity of frame styles further bolsters the faux High Street custom framing aesthetic: the clashing styles dragging attention away from the drawings towards the frame, aggressively highlighting an expanded semiotic field.

The controlled ‘extended’ setting (“as directed by Verhoeven”) and the inclusion of pop paraphernalia was, broadly speaking, ‘intracompositional’, but more specifically ‘supplementary’ to the drawings. The individual ‘immediate’ frames functioned to harmonise with each individual drawing (separating each from the group) whilst simultaneously binding each drawing to the “psychedelic grotto” created by Verhoeven.

Verhoeven’s ‘immediate’ and ‘extended’ framing approach bears all the hallmarks of Derrida’s logic of supplementarity8 in which the need to supplement is explained - in Pearson’s words - by “a lack in the assumed plenitude of that which is supplemented”.9 This is not to suggest that Verhoeven’s drawings lack anything in themselves as drawings, but rather, as an Illustrator, Verhoeven’s drawings were in this instance supplemented firstly by their ‘immediate’ frames and then by their ‘extended’ setting.

Jacky Redgate / Tracey Emin. The ‘list of works’ for Jacky Redgate’s exhibition Life of the System 1980 - 2005 at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2005-6, reveals the varying status attributed to the ‘immediate’ physical frame by Redgate in her various photographic works. This is evident when comparing the differences between how one photographic series has been listed against another. For example, with some works the mat and wooden frame are listed as relevant materials and the dimensions of the works have been taken from the

8 See Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1976), p. 155-160. 9 John H. Pearson, ‘The Politics of Framing in the Late Nineteenth Century’ in Mosaic (23/1, 1990), p. 22. Also see Jacques Derrida’s Speech and Phenomena (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1973), p. 87, where he describes the supplement as an addition that comes to make up for a deficiency. 140 outer edge of the frame, whilst with other works the mode of presentation (the frame, mounting method and substrate specifications etc.) have been omitted, as follows:

unknown. A Portrait Chronicle of Photographs, England 1953-1962 1980-83 vintage gelatin silver photographs, mat, wooden frame 15 parts, each frame 76.2 x 50.8 cm

Life of the System #1, #3, #5, #7, #8, #9, #10, #12, #14, #15 1998-2000 type C photographs dimensions variable

STRAIGHTCUT #6, #8, #9, #15, #16, #17, #18, #19 2001-2003 type C photographs each 75 x 98 cm10

The subtle differences in the way works are listed can provide invaluable clues as to the role of the frame and can potentially realign a viewer’s approach to a work and dramatically alter his or her interpretation of it. In the case of photographer unknown. A Portrait Chronicle of Photographs, England 1953-1962 [Figure 50] the viewer is alerted to the fact that they are not just looking at a series of photographic images, but a specific type of photograph (silver gelatin prints) that have been presented and framed in a specific and (presumably) non-arbitrary way.

In fact, without such information - and without the subsequent mental readjustment of the physical boundary of each work within the mind of the viewer - the key to unlock the essence of this work would remain hidden, or would at least be much harder to find. Because far from arbitrary, extra-artistic, or ‘disengaged’, an appreciation of Redgate’s chosen style of framing for photographer unknown... is fundamental to a satisfactory understanding of the work.

10 MCA, Jacky Redgate - Life of the System 1980 - 2005 (Sydney: MCA, list of works, 28 November 2005 - 5 March 2006). 141

Figure 50: Jacky Redgate, photographer unknown. A Portrait Chronicle of Photographs, England 1953-1962 (1980-83), gelatin silver photographs, mat, wooden frame, 76.2 x 50.8 cm [frame]. Installation: Jacky Redgate - Life of the System 1980–2005, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2005-06. Photo: Jenni Carter

As curator Russell Storer points out in his text which accompanied the MCA exhibition, the reproduced group of Redgate’s family snapshots as large prints displaces “the authorship of the photographs … presenting everyday amateur photography as [professional] contemporary art”.11 The museum-style box frame thus completes the representation of a framed museum photograph. It is here, in Redgate’s desire to simulate a framed museum photograph, that I would argue the frame goes beyond being ‘disengaged’ and ‘supplementary’, and becomes ‘intrinsic’ to the work. The dynamic of Redgate’s work can not be found internally within each photographic image, but within the reproduction, recontextualisation and (re)framing of the photographs. It would therefore compromise the work to describe or photographically reproduce individual images from the photographer unknown... series without also representing the frame

11 Russell Storer, Jacky Redgate; Life of the System 1980 - 2005 (Sydney: MCA, exhibition brochure, 28 November 2005 - 5 March 2006), unpaginated. 142 because the frame forms an integral part of both the form and content of the work, whilst contributing to and communicating the work’s outward aesthetic.12

Although this is reaffirmed by the listing specifications noted above, curiously, images from the photographer unknown... series are presented without their frames in Redgate’s 2005 publication - Jacky Redgate 1980-2003.13 This is despite the manner in which other photographic series within the same publication have been documented - including Naar het Schilder-Boeck (1985) [Figure 51], TAMING-THE-SPECTRUM (1987) and A Picture is No Substitute for Anything (1996) [Figure 52] - where contrary to convention, the frame (and mat) have been included. One explanation for this could be that Michael Desmond’s essay, which literally enframes the photographer unknown... images in Redgate’s publication, sufficiently describes the work and the role played by the ‘immediate’ physical frame. In addition to this, the frames, mats, outer frame dimensions, and full titles for each image are clearly listed on page 38 of the publication.

IG: What was the thought process behind the frame for your photographer unknown... series?

JR: It is a standard museum frame - the prints are 20 x 24". I was aware of the implications of printing family photographs and putting them in a museum context, but I had not considered a post-modern reading of the work.

IG: Was the frame central to the work from the start or did you consider different ways of presenting the photographs?

12 Although I accept that some frames do not fall quite so comfortably or neatly within the boundary of a particular category as others, and borderline cases do exist, I have resisted the temptation to further dissect my frame categories in order to keep this thesis as coherent as possible. However, just as I claim that there are degrees of ‘intracompositionality’, so too are there degrees of ‘intrinsicness’ and ‘supplementaryness’ etc. Thus, as well as discussing what category a frame belongs to, it is also possible to discuss at which end of the category spectrum a particular frame falls. For example, I would argue that Redgate’s frame for her photographer unknown... series falls towards the ‘supplementary’ end of the ‘intrinsic’ scale, mainly because - unlike some ‘intrinsic’ frames - it is instantly recognisable as a frame. 13 Jacky Redgate (with essay by Michael Desmond), Jacky Redgate 1980-2003 (Parkside: Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia, 2005). 143 JR: It was central to the work from the start and I did not consider other ways. It was the early 1980s and I had a background in sculpture. I learnt to print in on fibre with photographer unknown… and it was on the cusp of mural printing. The museum box frame is a legacy of Modernism and seemed the logical frame to use for 20 x 24 inch prints.

IG: Why was the photographer unknown... series reproduced minus its frame in your monograph compared to A Picture is No Substitute for Anything (1996), TAMING-THE-SPECTRUM (1987), and Naar het Schilder-Boeck (1985) which appear within their frames?

JR: It was a decision by CACSA the designer of the monograph... the frame for A Picture is No Substitute for Anything is made from MDF, a substitute wood… For TAMING-THE-SPECTRUM the frames are square to contain different photographic formats. The mounts are therefore irregular shapes contained within the square… the text on the glass in Naar het Schilder- Boeck is sandblasted so the work is an object and the frame integral to the work.14

14 Jacky Redgate, email interview with author, 10 December 2007 - 25 January 2008. 144

Figure 51: Jacky Redgate, Big Fish Eat Little Fish (1985) from the series Naar het Schilder-Boeck, gelatin silver photograph, mat with ink stamp, sandblasted glass, 1105 x 1092 mm (frame size).

Figure 52: Jacky Redgate, A Picture is No Substitute for Anything #11 (1996), C-type photograph, mat, glass, custom-made frame in composition board, 486 x 425 mm. 145 If we now compare the wooden frame from the photographer unknown... series with the frame used for the Life of the System series (also a wooden frame) we find very little formal difference. Both frames are fairly standard box frames. However, both frames function in different ways and demarcate very different physical and conceptual spaces for their associated photographs.

The absence of frame specifications for the Life of the System series on the MCA’s ‘list of works’ implies that there is less of a contextual or outward aesthetic at play here than was the case with photographer unknown.... For the Life of the System series, the frame initially appears to function in line with a utilitarian box frame (by simply offering a means to present and protect the photographs without distracting attention away from them). The photographic image dominates and successfully beats the frame into retreat. In this respect, the frame for the Life of the System series could be seen as ‘disengaged’, but a case could be made for the frame playing a ‘supplementary’ role. This is due to the taxonomic nature of the grouped objects within the photographs, and the use of a vitrine-like box frame: the grouped objects appearing as if displayed in a vitrine.

IG: Could you say a bit about your choice of frame for the Life of the System series?

JR: This is a readymade frame - I chose it because the objects are flattened by the bending of the bellows in the large format camera and it gives depth to the work as an object. The history of frames in photography is something that has always interested me - that frames were designed for the actual photograph, rather than generic. Perhaps also interesting to note is that I don’t crop the camera formats - the format of the camera I have used is always a residue in the work.15

15 Ibid. 146

As Michael Desmond points out, the exact boundary to Redgate’s works are often ambiguous. Desmond states that Redgate sidesteps “an easy, facile interpretation of her work by using different framing and presentation devices”. The viewer, Desmond continues, “is left with difficulty in knowing how, or even whether, to look beyond the surface”.16

It is interesting to note that despite the formal similarities between the frames for Redgate’s photographer unknown... series and her Life of the System series, the differences in function can to some extent be controlled (encoded if you like) through the manipulation and maintenance of the ‘circumtextual’ frame: in this case, the wall labels, ‘list of works’, exhibition catalogue, and other subsequent documentation of the work.

If the frame for Redgate’s photographer unknown... series is an example of a box frame tipping slightly over into the realm of being ‘intrinsic’, then Tracey Emin’s frame for her My Major Retrospective 1963 - 1993 exhibition held at White Cube, London, in 1993/4 could be regarded as a box frame functioning as a ‘supplementary’ frame.

For this exhibition Emin collected, arranged and archived a large assortment of personal objects and ephemera into small clusters to create a series of individual works which poetically documented key events in her life. The works were listed on the gallery’s ‘list of works’ as per the one below:

Uncle Colin The last thing he held; The puzzle box he played with; The newspaper his crash was in; The seagull - he and mum found; Two photos of him - him with his first car and him looking out to sea.17

This cluster of memorabilia laconically documents the life of Emin’s Uncle Colin and the car crash which eventually killed him. It includes the now famous crumpled cigarette box that Colin was holding at the time of impact, a newspaper with the

16 Ibid., p. 33. 17 White Cube, Tracey Emin - My Major Retrospective 1963 - 1993 (London: White Cube, list of works, 19 November 1993 - 9 January 1994). 147 headline: DRIVER DIES IN HORROR CRASH, and various other elements which contextualise and compound a sense of tragedy and loss [see Figure 53].

Figure 53: Tracey Emin, Uncle Colin (1963-93), framed memorabilia, dimensions variable.

It would be hard to dispute that the essence of Uncle Colin as a work of art lies more in the dynamic created by the selected objects (and their ability to communicate emotive narrative) than in the way the objects have been individually framed. In fact, it is possible to describe Uncle Colin and its dynamic without once referring to the ‘immediate’ frames which surround each object - as was the case in the previous two paragraphs.

That said, the frames for Uncle Colin go somewhat beyond having a ‘disengaged’ function, because far from aspiring to neutrality and invisibility or attempting to recede into the background, these frames (like those in Redgate’s photographer unknown... series) consciously emulate museum/gallery-style frames. In Emin’s case, the frames serve to imply and reaffirm her personal belongings as genuine-looking museum artefacts or memorabilia. However, where the contextualising function of the ‘immediate’ frame is fundamental to activate Redgate’s photographer unknown... series, it is ‘supplementary’ to Emin’s Uncle Colin. The emphasis for Redgate was on the (re)framing of her family photographs, whereas for Emin the emphasis was more 148 focussed on the actual configurations of memorabilia and the creation of specific autobiographical narratives.18 In this respect, the frames in Uncle Colin actively contribute to the representation of a museum-like display of cherished objects, but they (the frames) are not essential for a satisfactory reading or understanding of the work. However, because Uncle Colin consists of various individually framed parts, it would be impossible to photographically represent the work in a single image without also including the frames.

What these subtle differences in function reveal is that it is not always reliable to assess a frame’s relevance or relationship to an artwork according to its physical form: above are examples of simple box frames (which are usually employed and interpreted as ‘disengaged’ frames) functioning as ‘intrinsic’ and ‘supplementary’ frames. And whilst it may be common for contemporary artists to utilise standard ‘gallery-style’ box framing as a means to provide ‘neutral’, protective and transportable space for an artwork, this convention is by no means a guarantee that the frame is not being employed by an artist to function in a more sophisticated and unexpected way.

Gavin Turk, Stool (1990) / Yuji Takeoka, Floating Pedestal (1992). In 1994 I visited an exhibition by London-based artist Gavin Turk titled Collected Works 1989-1993. Turk was fairly well known at the time for exhibiting an empty studio space for his MA degree show at the Royal College of Art. Empty, that is, except for a single blue ceramic wall-mounted plaque with white lettering (like those produced for heritage buildings around London) which read: GAVIN TURK Sculptor worked here 1989-1991.19

The Collected Works 1989-1993 exhibition was presented by Jay Jopling (founding director of White Cube) and took place within the small rooms of an unoccupied shop just off Charing Cross Road, London. Walking from room to room it was usually fairly evident where and at what Turk was directing visitors to look. His use of museum-style

18 Desmond notes: “Redgate does not see herself as a storyteller constructing simple narratives... She places greater emphasis on exploring the semantics of materials, through her various motifs and systems, than on conveying an exclusively personal response to her forms for the viewer” in Redgate, p. 33. 19 Gavin Turk is now regarded as one of the main (YBA’s) of the nineties and is represented by White Cube, London. 149 plinths and vitrines looked slightly at odds with the non-museum (and non-white cube) venue, but they seemed to have a heightened function because of this. As I entered one room, however, there were no clearly framed objects, no vitrines, no plinths, nothing on the walls, just an old paint-spattered stool off to one side of the otherwise empty room. Turk’s practice of presenting occasionally easy-to-miss artworks within quite prominent display cases was absent here.20

Figure 54: Gavin Turk, Stool (1990), 900 mm (height).

20 I am thinking of Floater (1993) which features small chewed bits of chewing gum stuck to the ceiling of a glass display case on a plinth; and pipe (1991) which is a small liquorice pipe cast in bronze and painted to resemble the original, exhibited in an oversized display case which appeared to question rather than confirm the pipe’s significance. 150 After exhausting all other possibilities, I pondered the stool. It looked like an old school or college stool, probably from an art department judging by the paint spatters. It did not appear to have been altered or cared for in any way and had one missing cross bar. But it was definitely an authentic stool, not cast in bronze and painted, or subject to any other Turk-like tactic. I sat on the stool, still not fully convinced that it was in fact part of the exhibition, and glanced once more around the room to make sure that I had not missed anything.

As I left the exhibition, I did the customary gathering of gallery handouts and there on a card promoting the exhibition was a picture of the stool. On the reverse it read:

Stool 1990 Wooden stool with glass 90cm (height)

What I had missed was the small bit of glass which had been inlaid into the hand-slot on the seat of the stool, which thus, according to Turk, transformed the stool into a frame [see Figure 54]. This ‘absolute’ frame not only acts as a comment on art’s self- reflexivity and tendency to occasionally peer (and disappear) up its own backside, but specifically on Turk’s own tendency to make art about art about art. For Turk, this approach has in the past resulted in a re-hashing of Robert Morris’ mirrored cubes in Untitled 1965-72 (1990); a fresh look at Van Gogh’s pipe on a chair via Jasper Johns’ two beer cans in pipe (1991); and a reworking of Warhol’s Triple Elvis (1963) via Sid Vicious and Madame Tussauds in Pop (1993) [Figure 55] - among many other possible examples. More recently, with reference to his 1998 solo exhibition at the South London Gallery, Turk was quoted as saying he was now attempting to slightly cliché or reference his own work - a declaration of his intent for his art to disappear even further up its own backside.21

21 Marina Benjamin, ‘Young British Turk’ in Evening Standard (London, Tuesday 15 September 1998), p. 29. 151

Figure 55: Gavin Turk, Pop (1993), glass, brass, MDF, fibre glass, wax, clothing and gun, 2790 x 1150 x 1150 mm.

In the context of the 1994 exhibition, Stool needed no frame because Stool was a frame; the fact that people sat on Stool (myself included), in a sense, activated the stool. Had Stool been cordoned off by museum wire, presented on a white base, sectioned off within floor markings, or presented in a display case, then a degree of intimacy would have been lost.

Intimacy between the viewer and artwork, however, must be balanced with the protection of the artwork from the viewer. This raises the issue of the frame’s traditional function as a protective barrier, and what happens when the frame is incorporated into the artwork, essentially becoming part of the artwork or, as in the case of Stool, becoming the artwork in total. ‘Intracompositional’ frames are clearly not as replaceable or conceptually inert as ‘disengaged’ frames and therefore need an increased level of consideration and care. The question being raised here then is: how are ‘absolute’,

152 ‘intrinsic’ and ‘supplementary’ frames themselves protected from the wear and tear of being exhibited?

If we look at Yuji Takeoka’s Floating Pedestal (1992) [Figure 56] - which could be described as an ‘absolute’ frame - we see a pedestal being relieved of its protective duty by another peripheral frame, a transparent box.

Figure 56: Yuji Takeoka, Floating Pedestal (1992), 600 x 850 x 850 mm.

Takeoka explores the form of display devices by presenting his specially created plinths, pedestals and bases as sculptures in their own right. His first series was begun in 1984, and an entire exhibition of these works was shown first in Belgium at the Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst, Ghent, in 1989 and then in Germany as public outdoor sculpture at Documenta IX, Kassel, in 1992.22

Floating Pedestal (1992) is, as its title suggests, a pedestal that is slightly set off of the floor. Although the pedestal is the primary focal point (bearing in mind that no work is

22 James Putnam, Art and Artifact: The Museum as Medium (London: Thames and Hudson, 2001), p. 45. 153 presented on top of it), the pedestal’s mirrored surfaces hint at invisibility by reflecting (or exhibiting) its surroundings, almost at the expense of its own form.

Floating Pedestal therefore highlights, by literally reflecting, a series of concentric physical frames. Firstly, from the centre outwards, we have the pedestal itself; then there is the transparent display case (which functions as a protective barrier to the mirrored pedestal, but which also functions by identifying the pedestal as an object of interest). Then there is the gallery or museum which acts as another frame and mediating layer. And finally we have the unavoidably complex and discursive ‘circumtextual’ frame which is made up of numerous circulating cellular elements such as press-releases, gallery texts, exhibition catalogues, as well as Putnam’s above quoted publication, and now this thesis (courtesy of Takeoka’s inclusion within it).

The series of frames which Takeoka’s Floating Pedestal is enmeshed within, suggest to the viewer that the pedestal (along with its glass box), contrary to conventional expectations, constitutes the artwork. The surrounding frames create a physical and psychological barrier between the viewer and the pedestal. This protective distance (implied and physical) is essential when an artwork starts to appear too much like the thing conventionally employed to create such a distance.

It is customary in museums and galleries not to touch artworks, but fairly accepted that through the course of an exhibition, protective bases and plinths will accrue scuff marks from passing shoes, and that vitrines and display cases will acquire nose and finger prints from exhibition visitors intent on getting as close to the exhibits as physically possible.23 When the boundary between what constitutes the (untouchable) artwork and what constitutes the (protective and likely to be touched) frame becomes blurred, then it is sometimes necessary for extra protective layers to be introduced, because, in certain circumstances, frames need to be framed.

23 It is not always the case that artworks should not be touched. Some artworks require the physical interaction of an audience to be considered complete. For example, in 1995 at the Serpentine Gallery, London, Hans Ulrich Obrist curated Take Me (I’m Yours) which invited gallery visitors to touch, transform, try, and take away artworks. 154 Marcus Harvey.

Square canvases are framed by broad white borders that mimic the format of the polaroid prints which are their source. The device simultaneously elevates the pictures with its formal elegance, and lowers the tone by referring to suburban smut.24

Between 1993 and 1994, Marcus Harvey produced a series of paintings which took as their starting point the amateur pornographic photographs sent in to adult magazines by their readers. With titles such as Readers Wife 1 (1993-4) [Figure 57] and Julie from Hull (1994) the sources of Harvey’s graphic images are never in doubt. Each painting can essentially be broken down into three parts. Firstly there is the black outlined image of a female nude; then, interacting with that image, is a finger-painted abstract expressionist background; and finally there is a white border which contains (and forms a part of) the painting.

Figure 57: Marcus Harvey, Reader’s Wife 1 (1993-4), oil on canvas, 2130 x 2130 mm.

24 Sarah Kent, Shark Infested Waters: The Saatchi Collection of British Art in the 90s (London: Zwemmer, 1994), p. 34. 155 Harvey’s in-built margins are reminiscent of Georges Seurat’s in-built painted borders, which were also situated directly on the canvas [see Figure 58], but their function is quite different. The white borders in Harvey’s paintings serve to distance him from the initial composition: the capture of the photographic image. The paintings appear as representations of Polaroid photographs rather than as representations of nudes in the flesh. The photographic composition and its edge, it is implied, is out of Harvey’s control.25 In contrast, Seurat’s abstract borders create colour-controlled settings for his pictorial representations, and as a consequence, reaffirm his role as image-maker, master of composition, and controller of his own edge and border.26

Figure 58: Georges Seurat, Young Woman Powdering Herself (1988 - 90), oil on canvas, 955 x 795 mm.

25 Polaroids were the photographic medium of choice for amateur ‘adult’ photographers at the time because they were instant and did not need to be sent away for processing - this was obviously prior to . 26 For recent literature relating to Seurat’s painted borders see: Matthias Waschek, ‘Georges Seurat - The Frame as Boundary and Extension of the Artwork’ in Eva Mendgen (ed), In Perfect Harmony: Picture and Frame 1850-1920 (Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum, 1995), pp. 149-162; Richard Tilston, Seurat (London: Bison Books Ltd., 1991), p. 149 and 166; Robert L. Herbert, Seurat and the Making of La Grande Jatte (Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago, 2004), p. 146; and Inge Fiedler, ‘La Grande Jatte: A Study of the Materials and Painting Technique’ in Herbert, pp. 202-205. 156 As established in Chapter 1, frames not only function as ‘finding and focusing’ devices for the viewer, they also act as ‘positioning and cropping’ devices for the artist. Through the cropping of an image, attention is called “to the power of the artist to delineate a particular composition”.27 At first, it appears that Harvey has relinquished control of the frame and composition through his use of readymade photographs. However, Harvey’s decision to incorporate the white Polaroid border into his paintings has a paradoxical effect. It does indeed communicate to the viewer that the composition of the photographic image was beyond his control, but it also reasserts his power as artist to select that image and then to define the edge of his own work. The Polaroid’s white margin, therefore, not only emphasises and acts as a physical reinforcement of the edge of the photographic image (doing so from its inner-most point), it also demarcates the boundary of Harvey’s composition (from its outer-most point).

Where Pearson described Seurat’s pointillist abstract borders as forming “part of the composition but not part of the picture”,28 it could be argued that Harvey’s white borders form part of the composition and part of the picture: the picture being defined by Harvey from the outside edge of the Polaroid photograph rather than from the outside edge of the photographic image.

Despite the ‘invisibility’ of white margins on the written page and the convention of white as a ‘neutral’ or ‘disengaged’ setting for artworks, Harvey’s white margins can be regarded as ‘intrinsic’. They form an inseparable part of the form and content of the paintings (being conceived and developed in unison with the paintings rather than added in response to each pictorial image after their completion). To this extent, their ‘intrinsic’ status is more emphatic than that of Seurat’s borders, despite Pearson’s assertion that Seurat’s borders are “thoroughly intra-compositional”.29

Seurat’s borders are undoubtedly ‘intracompositional’, but whether they are ‘intrinsic’ or ‘supplementary’ is another (more intricate) question. The answer is not always as straight-forward as it is with Harvey’s borders. The main claim for Seurat’s borders

27 See Meyer Schapiro, ‘On Some Problems in the Semiotics of Visual Art: Field and Vehicle in Image - Signs’ in Semiotica (1, 3, 1969), p. 227; and Pearson, p. 19, for quotation. 28 Pearson, p. 20. 29 Ibid., p. 20. 157 being ‘intrinsic’ (as opposed to ‘supplementary’) comes from their in-built nature, the fact that they can not simply be replaced by an alternative border.30

Seurat realised that by incorporating the frame into the canvas, the ‘immediate’ setting for his pictorial images could be controlled to a far greater extent than would be the case with an independent frame. The rationale being that it is easier (and more acceptable) for a dealer or collector to change a painting’s detachable frame than it is for them to re- stretch a canvas: ‘artist’s’ frames were readily replaced in the late nineteenth century, but it would have been considered sacrilegious to alter an artist’s canvas. The inclusion of Seurat’s frame onto the canvas, I would argue, makes his border ‘intrinsic’, not least because the border is now physically built into the painting. However, it could certainly be argued that Seurat’s pointilist borders painted onto removable frames (rather than onto the canvas) function as ‘supplementary’ frames. The fact that most of Seurat’s original frames have been removed and lost is proof in itself that the frames were not absolutely essential to the surviving paintings.31

Seurat’s borders have been interpreted in various ways. They have been seen as a link or buffer between the picture and the external world;32 as a way of controlling the shadow cast from the frame;33 and as a representation or confirmation of Seurat’s artistic consciousness,34 among others. All readings ultimately point, however, to

30 It has been widely reported, however, that Seurat added borders to some of his paintings completed prior to 1888 (the year that he started painting his borders directly on to the canvas): see Waschek in Mendgen, pp. 154-158; Henri Dorra and John Rewald, Seurat (Paris: Les Beaux-Arts Editions, D’Etudes et de Documents, 1959), pp. cii-ciii, as quoted by Pearson, p.20; and W. H. Bailey, Defining Edges: A New Look at Picture Frames (New York: Abrams, 2002), p. 94. Seurat apparently re- stretched some of his canvases to allow for a new border, and in some cases even painted over the edges of existing pictures. This certainly implies ‘supplementaryness’ because ‘supplementary’ frames are often conceived and developed separately from their associated artworks - often after their completion. This argument could be countered by saying that Seurat’s initial paintings were ‘works- in-progress’, and that an artist has every right to revisit an artwork and to alter or redefine the edge of a work. 31 Tilston notes that Le Crotoy, Upstream (1889) [see Figure 12], exhibited in 1889 with Le Crotoy, Downstream, is remarkable in that it is the only painting by Seurat to survive with its painted frame intact, p. 149. Herbert claims, however, that Le Crotoy, Upstream is one of a few to survive with its original frame, p. 147. Bailey also notes that the original ‘artist’s’ frame for Seurat’s Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte (1884/5) was replaced by a simple strip frame, before being reframed once again by the Art Institute of Chicago who attempted to reproduce the original frame, p. 94. 32 See Germano Celant, ‘Framed: Innocence or Gilt?’ in Artforum (Vol. 20, March, 1982), p. 53, and Brian O’Doherty, Inside the White Cube (San Francisco: The Lapis Press, 1986), p. 23. Both describe how Seurat’s pointillist borders "muffle" the abruptness of the edge of his paintings. 33 Waschek in Mendgen, p. 158. Wascheck refers to French art critic Felix Feneon (1861-1944) for this interpretation. 34 Pearson, p. 20. 158 Seurat’s desire to control the ‘immediate’ setting within which his works are to be encountered.

Helen Chadwick. If we look at the framing of Helen Chadwick’s Wreaths to Pleasure series (1992-93) [see Figures 59 and 62], we can see an attempt by Chadwick to create colour-controlled settings for her vividly coloured photographs.

Figure 59: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no. 11 (1992-3), cibachrome photograph, powder-coated steel, glass, aluminium faced MDF, 1100 x 1100 x 50 mm.

159

Circular, luminous colour photographs, framed in coloured enamelled metal, this series of images represents delicate bondings of flowers in barely held suspension with a variety of viscous fluids. The artist carefully exploits the unpredictable behaviour of household liquids - the fizz of Swarfega running against tomato juice - and the unexpected richness of their intrinsic colours when combined with plant life, like supreme parodies of the common or garden seed packet: dandelions and hair gel, narcissi and bath bubbles, bluebells in oil and milk, tulips with plum and engine oil, delphiniums in pink Germolene.35

The thirteen round cibachrome photographs which make up the Wreaths to Pleasure series (1992-93) featured in Chadwick’s 1994 solo exhibition at the Serpentine Gallery, London.36 What was particularly striking about the presentation of these photographs was that each had a prominent colour-coordinated tondo frame. At a time when it was the norm to exhibit photographs either dry-mounted onto a substrate with no frame, pinned directly to the wall, or in ‘neutral’ inconspicuous box frames, Chadwick’s photographs stood out as being very overtly framed.

Clearly these frames can be regarded as ‘artist’s’ frames and, according to Pearson’s definition, as ‘intracompositional’, but to what extent do these frames form a part of each work, and to what extent do they present each work? Further analysis is obviously required to find out how these frames function and to ascertain whether they could be described as either ‘intrinsic’ or ‘supplementary’.

35 Marjorie Allthorpe-Guyton, ‘A Purpose in Liquidity’ in Helen Chadwick, Effluvia (London: Serpentine Gallery, 1994), p. 14. 36 This exhibition was an international collaboration between three venues: the Museum Folkwang in Essen, the fundacio ‘la Caixa’ in Barcelona, and the Serpentine Gallery in London. 160 As outlined in my Introduction, an ‘intrinsic’ frame is a frame that is considered to be an integral and inseparable part of an artwork and its content, and which constitutes part of what is being presented rather than frames what is being presented. Despite the relative prominence of Chadwick’s frames (at least by contemporary standards), I would argue that they are subordinate to the photographs which they contain. Although the physical removal of each frame would surely qualify as blatant amputation, the editing out of the frame in promotional material relating to the Serpentine exhibition (as we will see shortly) does not essentially destroy the logic of the work. The photographic image remains, and it is the photograph which forms the nucleus and dominant drive of each work.

Despite the sculptural implications of arranging the flowers and substances which make up the photographic images, and the presence of the framed photographs as objects in themselves, works from the Wreaths to Pleasure series are usually referred to as cibachrome photographs. Thus, image is prioritised over object. In fact, Chadwick has herself referred to the Wreaths to Pleasure as pictorial counterparts to the sculptural presence of Cacao (1994),37 which also formed part of the Serpentine exhibition.

The ‘separability’ (or ‘disposability’) of Chadwick’s coloured tondo frame is evident in the Serpentine Gallery’s exhibition brochure which presented Chadwick’s Wreath to Pleasure # 11 minus its frame [see Figure 60] with the following caption:

Right: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no 11, 1994 [sic]. Colour Cibachrome38

37 See Helen Chadwick and Judith Collins, ‘An Opera for Milly Mud: Artist Helen Chadwick in Conversation with Judith Collins’ in Jackie Heuman (ed), From Marble to Chocolate: The Conservation of Modern Sculpture (London: Archetype Publications, 2001), p. 158. Cocoa (1994) was a bubbling fountain of molten chocolate. 38 Serpentine Gallery, Serpentine Gallery Bulletin, June - August 1994 (London: Serpentine Gallery, gallery brochure) unpaginated. 161

Figure 60: Serpentine gallery brochure with Wreath to Pleasure no. 11 minus frame.

Obviously neither a mention of the frame nor its materials was seen as necessary here, thus implying to gallery visitors a certain lack of frame ‘intrinsicness’.39

39 Although I accept that Chadwick might not have had much control over the production of this brochure, it is still important in exposing an ambiguity over the extent to which Chadwick’s ‘immediate’ frame forms part of the work. 162 In Effluvia, the publication produced to accompany Chadwick’s Serpentine exhibition, the Wreaths to Pleasure series were again presented minus their frames. However, as if unsure as to whether the frames were part of the work or not, Chadwick’s photographs were set on colour-coordinated page backgrounds corresponding to the (approximate) colours of the frames [see Figure 61].

Figure 61: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no. 1 (1992-3) as represented in the publication Effluvia.

163 These colour plates were listed as follows:

Wreath to Pleasure, Nos. 1-13 1992-93 Cibachrome photographs, powder coated steel, glass, aluminium faced MDF 110 x 110 x 5 Edition 1/4 Plates 1 - 1040

Note the inclusion this time of the framing materials.

In Mark Sladen’s publication Helen Chadwick - produced to accompany Chadwick’s 2004 retrospective at the Barbican Gallery, London, after her premature death in 1996 - all thirteen of the Wreaths to Pleasure series were presented with their intended frames, complete with what appears to be an enhanced computer-generated frame shadow and highlight to clarify that the coloured border is in fact an actual (detachable) frame [see Figures 59 and 62].41

40 Helen Chadwick, Effluvia (London: Serpentine Gallery, 1994), p. 67. 41 Mark Sladen (ed), Helen Chadwick (Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz Publishers, 2004). 164

Figure 62: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no. 1 (1992-3), cibachrome photograph, powder-coated steel, glass, aluminium faced MDF, 1100 x 1100 x 50 mm.

With such ambiguity over the extent to which the frames for the Wreaths to Pleasure series form part of the work, the following question could be posed: if the work can (on occasion) be documented without the frame, what kind of surplus physical and conceptual space is the frame responsible for providing?

165 As Sladen notes, in Chadwick’s mind, the round tondo form of the Wreaths to Pleasure series evokes “the bubble and its role as a symbol of transience”.42 So to some extent the frame can be seen as a mobile carrier which could (hypothetically) pop at any time. The implied membrane supplied by the frame seems to accentuate this effect. However, and paradoxically, the frame also counters this transitory feeling by asserting its physical presence and elbowing out physical space for the photograph; and then there is the connotation of the frame’s traditional function to protect (or preserve) the artwork. So in equal measure (and quite unusually) the frame appears to connote both ephemerality and longevity.

Chadwick’s frames could also be read more simplistically as a means (merely) of providing transportable and unique colour-controlled settings for the photographs, akin to how a coloured matboard might function around a photograph or work on paper. To this extent, the frame aids the overall presence and composition of the work, providing a more contained and aesthetically controlled experience for the viewer.

I would like now to speculate on a more intricate reading of Chadwick’s coloured enamelled frames; one which I am confident she would have considered during the course of framing.43 I think it is highly likely that Chadwick would have recognised some conceptual significance in the materials and processes associated with the enamelling of the metal frames. Running throughout her practice was an obsession with liquidity, mutability, and the body’s constant state of flux between conscious living substance and dead matter and form. The fluidity of boundaries implicit in the enamelling process (the passage from powder to liquid to solid form) would not have gone unnoticed by Chadwick. Perhaps this explains the very specific citing of “powder- coated steel” on the material specifications in both the Effluvia (1994) and Helen Chadwick (2004) publications.44 Although this can be seen as another level to the relationship between the Wreaths to Pleasure photographs and their frames, it would not to my mind alter the status of the frames as ‘supplementary’.

42 Ibid., p. 25. Chadwick had referred to circles as being like bubbles in her conversation with Judith Collins, see Chadwick and Collins in Heuman, p. 158. 43 Due to Chadwick’s death in 1996 this can not be confirmed with the artist. 44 Chadwick (1994), p. 67; and Sladen, pp. 152-153. 166

Figure 63: Helen Chadwick, Meat Abstract # 4 (1989), colour Polaroid, silk mat, framed, 810 x 710 mm.

Similarly, in earlier works such as the Meat Abstracts (1989) [Figure 63] - photographs of raw meat (liver, tongue, tripe etc) displayed on animal skins and silk - the mats surrounding the photographs have been specified in both the Effluvia and Helen Chadwick publications as being “silk mats”.45 Although silk mats are quite widely used in conservation framing, it is extremely unusual to see the specific type of mat used by an artist listed on an artwork’s specifications. This strongly implies that Chadwick recognised that the framing product had a certain appropriateness to her work: the silk mat being the product of silkworm effluence. In this instance, it would appear that the neutral-looking mats for the Meat Abstracts actually play a ‘supplementary’ role.

45 Chadwick (1994), p. 66; and Sladen, p. 150. 167 Counter Editions. Having worked for a number of years in various framing studios, the most consistent request from artists and collectors alike is for a frame which complements the artwork, without drawing attention away from it. The frame should be discreet, anonymous, and as often requested, “invisible”, “neutral” or “gallery-style”. Although there is a wealth of options available within this brief, what is being requested, in essence, is a ‘disengaged’ frame: a frame which is appropriate for the artwork, but is not to be seen as part of the work itself.

In most cases, the artwork would be brought into the framing studio rolled up in a tube or sandwiched between two bits of board to keep it flat. The impending frame is to serve two main purposes: to allow the artwork to be seen, and to protect the artwork whilst being seen. As with all ‘disengaged’ frames, the utilitarian function of the frame should eclipse any conceptual intentions. The frame is almost unanimously regarded as something which could be changed and updated at will according to changing framing developments and trends, whilst the artwork is seen as something finite, fixed, and to be preserved ‘as is’ indefinitely.46 The suggested separation here between artwork and frame implies that the artwork is ‘complete’ regardless of whether it is framed or not. In such cases, the added frame clearly demarcates the border of the work from its inner edge rather than from its outer edge.

One way of evaluating an artwork’s reliance on a frame is to see how it would fare in a separation test away from it. Would the artwork be considered temporarily incomplete whilst ‘unframed’? If the work is to be transported, could it be de-framed and framed at its destination (possibly in a different style of frame) without fundamentally altering the medium and dimensions of the work? Put another way, could the work be sold ‘unframed’ as well as ‘framed’?47

If an artwork can be sold ‘unframed’, this would suggest that the frame’s role is more utilitarian than conceptual, and that the frame plays a limited role in the artwork’s content and how it should be interpreted. If an artwork cannot be sold minus its frame,

46 Many conservation framers recommend that the frame is constantly monitored, maintained, and/or replaced in order to help conserve the frame’s contents; see for example http://www.asaframers.com.au/info/index.html [20 May 2007]. 47 It is common practice for commercial galleries to list a ‘framed’ and ‘unframed’ price for artworks when produced in series. 168 this would imply that the frame is either ‘supplementary’ or ‘intrinsic’ to the artwork (unless, of course, the artwork is an ‘absolute’ frame). The frame, in such a case, would be considered more remarkable than a ‘disengaged’ frame, possibly unique, or in some way conceptually entwined within the individual logic of the artwork. Removal of this latter frame would therefore have greater destructive implications for an artwork.

Of the 35 editions by the 23 leading contemporary artists listed on the Counter Editions website, 31 editions were available with the option of purchasing them framed or unframed.48 Although there are obvious logistical reasons for selling an artwork without a frame (such as lower storage costs, quicker shipping times, cheaper transport costs, and less chance of damage during transit) the fact that the majority of Counter Editions’ artworks are available unframed exposes each of those works to the likelihood of a ‘post-production’ frame being added beyond the authorial control of the artist. Ordinarily, this can be seen as confirmation that an artist does not see the frame as an important and integral part of a particular work: the implication being that the artwork is supplied complete as an autonomous object, with the decision as to how it is later framed and presented being in the hands of the purchaser - the frame therefore being ‘extracompositional’.

Even though the frames listed for the Counter Editions’ artworks can be regarded as artist-controlled frames (as the frames were overseen by the artists involved, or at least had their stamp of approval), they predominantly function as ‘disengaged’ frames because they direct attention towards the artwork without ever appearing to assert themselves as part of the work. The frequency of white lacquered maple box frames (12 of the 35) and float mounting (18 of the 35) implies a uniformity of framing styles which also denies ‘supplementary’ leanings.

Although an adherence to current framing styles and conventions can be a defining factor for a ‘disengaged’ frame, and a degree of ‘neutrality’ or ‘invisibility’ can be attained through a respect for such conventions, it does not necessarily follow that swaying slightly from prevalent framing styles automatically turns a frame from a ‘disengaged’ frame into a ‘supplementary’ frame. For example, the frame for Mat

48 See http://www.countereditions.com [19 June 2006]. Of the 35 listed works, 6 were listed as sold out. Also note Sarah Lucas’ edition of 12 images printed onto iced cakes (each in a separate edition of 25) is counted as one work. 169 Collishaw’s Flesheater 4 (2000) [Figure 64] for Counter Editions is a maple frame sprayed with deep plum matt lacquer.

Figure 64: , Flesheater 4 (2000), silkscreen print on paper (edition of 300), 740 x 870 mm.

Despite deep plum being an unusual colour for a contemporary frame, it would be problematic to say that this makes Collishaw’s frame ‘supplementary’, for a number of reasons. The frame could evidently be replaced without drastically affecting the content and dimensions of the artwork. This is affirmed by Counter Editions offering the print for sale as either framed or unframed. The frame’s function is consistent with a ‘disengaged’ frame in that it presents the artwork without drawing attention to itself: the plum colour complements Collishaw’s print, rather than competes with it. The frame cannot be considered an essential (for ‘intrinsic’) or important (for ‘supplementary’) part of the work. And finally, to be considered ‘supplementary’, a frame must significantly alter the semiotic and conceptual field of the work, taking it in a direction (under the artist’s guidance) to a place that it might otherwise not have gone. Collishaw’s purple frame harmonises with and sets off the artwork, and in that sense is a considered and appropriate choice of frame, but to my mind it neither asserts a new boundary for the artwork nor significantly alters the semiotic or conceptual field of the work. Consistent with other ‘disengaged’ frames, it successfully recedes in relation to what it contains.

170 Jack Pierson. I recently came across an example of a frame which could be described as a borderline case between ‘disengaged’ and ‘supplementary’. The exhibition was by American artist Jack Pierson at Alison Jacques Gallery, London, and featured works from his Self Portrait series [see Figure 65]. In these works, Pierson had photographed and presented unidentified men in fairly classical-looking poses. Each portrait was of a different person (none of whom was Pierson himself, despite each work being titled Self Portrait) which collectively formed a singular but vague and discursive male identity - a kind of metaphorical self-portrait.

Figure 65: Jack Pierson, Self Portrait #25 (2005), digital pigment print on paper, 1360 x 1090 mm (unframed).

171 No matter how strong our own sense of who we are, the lust for some idealized version of ourselves is invariably summoned in the barrage of images endlessly flashing before us. Jack Pierson’s ‘Self Portrait’ series attests to this, underscoring at its core his own erotic impulse to be as desirable as those he desires, to become the very object of his own attraction.49

The framing of the Self Portrait series was unusual in that it combined the dry- mounting of the digital pigment prints (a framing technique associated with contemporary photography) with the addition of a 100mm wide white ‘cassetta’ frame (a frame profile which was common during the Renaissance, and appropriated later in white by painters including Seurat). The dry-mounted Self Portrait photographs had been ‘close’ framed (to the image edge) without glass, as if to resemble paintings on canvas. The frame, through its allusion to classical portrait painting, subtly shifts the field of the work from the outer edge of the photograph to the outer edge of the frame. However, creating ambiguity over the status and relevance of Pierson’s ‘cassetta’ frame is the counter argument that the frame simply provides an appropriate setting for the work without overtly drawing attention to itself: the whiteness of the frame against the white gallery wall aiding its ‘invisibility’ or ‘neutrality’.

This complexity reminds us that the relevance of a frame is not fixed but is subject (as is the artwork) to the individual perception and interpretation of the viewer. For some, Pierson’s frame would have barely registered and not warranted much of a mention (and for those viewers, the frame would have played a ‘disengaged’ role). For others, the ‘cassetta’ frame would have conceptually shifted Pierson’s contemporary photographs deeper into the territory of classical portraiture and painting (and for those, the frame’s function would have been ‘supplementary’).

The fact that the frame subtly reaffirms the work’s content rather than adds new content to the work (the allusion to painting being already encoded within the photographs through the poses of the subjects and the composition of the images), coupled with the frame’s apparent aspirations to ‘neutrality’, compounds the knife-edge status of this

49 Philip Gefter, ‘Self-Portrait as Obscure Object of Desire’ in The New York Times (18 December 2003) quoted in Alison Jacques Gallery, Jack Pierson (London: Alison Jacques Gallery, press-release, 20 October - 19 November 2005). 172 frame. On the one hand the frame subtly contributes to the work’s content, on the other, it seems to repel the attention. In such a borderline case, whether the frame contributes in a significant enough fashion to be considered ‘supplementary’ is ultimately a subjective decision. Relative to the Counter Editions’ white lacquered box frames (mentioned in the previous section), Pierson’s frames could be described as ‘supplementary’; but in comparison to other more overt ‘supplementary’ frames (which draw attention to themselves as much as to their contents), Pierson’s frames appear relatively ‘disengaged’.

Transitional points and the interface created by conflicting interpretations are a test for every method of grading and categorisation, but this does not nullify the benefits of such taxonomic frameworks. Rather, it highlights their analytical function by reasserting the nuances inherent within any category.

Hany Armanious / John Spiteri / Matthys Gerber. To investigate the transition from ‘disengaged’ to ‘supplementary’ and from ‘supplementary’ to ‘intrinsic’, I will now focus on three Australian artists who have recently created and exhibited artworks in ‘supplementary’ frames. The following frames by Hany Armanious, John Spiteri and Matthys Gerber all draw attention to themselves as well as to the works which they frame, and can therefore not claim to be aspiring to ‘neutrality’ or ‘invisibility’. Despite the frames interconnecting with what they contain in ways which go beyond what one would expect from a ‘disengaged’ frame, they do not fit the criteria to be considered ‘intrinsic’. An ‘intrinsic’ frame is incorporated into an artwork to such an extent that it is at times almost unrecognisable as a frame; such a state of osmosis is achieved that the in-built frame or container is rarely acknowledged as a separate entity from what it is framing. In contrast, the following works by Armanious, Spiteri and Gerber can comfortably be described as framed artworks: the frames fit neatly within the traditional notion of what a frame should be (four bits of wood circumnavigating the edge of a drawing or painting) and are therefore easily recognisable as frames. That they can so readily be acknowledged and discussed as frames - as distinguishable forms in their own right and separable from the works which they contain - points to a symbiotic rather than an osmotic relationship between work and frame. To this extent, these frames can be regarded as prime examples of ‘supplementary’ frames.

173 Hany Armanious’ 2003 solo exhibition Art Nouveau Barbeque at Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney, featured (amongst other works) four hair drawings and twelve wall rubbings which were listed on the gallery’s ‘list of works’ as follows:

Untitled hair drawing #2, 2003 human hair and acrylic binder on polyester, framed 33 x 25 cm (canvas size), 51.6 x 44.2 cm (frame size)

Untitled hair drawing #3, 2003 human hair and acrylic binder on linen, framed 40.5 x 29.5 cm (canvas size), 59 x 49 cm (frame size)

Untitled hair drawing #4, 2003 human hair and acrylic binder on paper on canvas, framed 30.2 x 25.4 cm (canvas size), 49.4 x 44.2 cm (frame size)

Untitled hair drawing #5, 2003 human hair and acrylic binder on polyester, framed 25.5 x 30 cm (canvas size), 44.4 x 49.2 cm (frame size)

Wall rubbing #6 - 17, 2003 clogged sandpaper, 23 x 28 cm (paper size), 34 x 41.5 cm (frame size)50

The Untitled hair drawings [see Figure 66] are imaginary portraits created from hairs taken from Armanious’ own head and from hairs which he collected from some of his friends. The exact expressions on the faces are, to a large extent, determined by the length and curl of the selected hairs. The hair drawings were distinctively (but uniformly) framed in wide black art nouveau frames, with sweeping decorative lines faintly echoing the twists and curls of the hairs in the drawings.

50 Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Hany Armanious - Art Nouveau Barbeque (Sydney: Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, list of works, 10 July - 9 August 2003). 174

Figure 66: Hany Armanious, Untitled hair drawing #5 (2003), human hair and acrylic binder on polyester, frame, 255 x 300 mm (canvas size), 444 x 492 mm (framed).

Quite unusually, the outer edge of the canvas was left visible (with a narrow cavity or ‘shadow line’ between the frame’s sight edge and the canvas, as opposed to the canvas edge being concealed beneath the frame’s rebate). This has the effect of reaffirming the canvas as a three-dimensional object rather than a two-dimensional image. It also subtly alludes to the autonomy of the hair drawing, and to the symbiotic rather than osmotic relationship between canvas and frame. This is again reaffirmed by the separation of “canvas size” and “frame size” on the ‘list of works’ (see above).

The accompanying Wall rubbings #6 - 17 [see Figure 67] were described in the exhibition text by Amanda Rowell as follows:

175 Occupying an entire wall in Armanious’ exhibition are views of distant galaxies and nebulae, like astronomical photographs taken of outer space. These constellar images are made from the residue of paint remaining on sheets of coarse black sandpaper after the artist had scoured a white wall. After the scouring process, the loose residue is removed by repeated washing. The remaining patterns of white particles calcified through friction are shining figures against a coarse black ground. Armanious’ sandpaper works are at once views of unfathomably large objects seen from great distances and the most meager crumbs of familiar matter trapped in crevices close to us. Armanious’ surfaces are typically three-dimensional. With his sandpaper works, he reworks the surrealist technique of frottage, creating visions of the infinite, expanding universe by modestly rubbing away at a wall.51

Figure 67: Hany Armanious, Wall rubbing #13 (2003), clogged sandpaper, frame, 230 x 280 mm (paper size), 340 x 415 mm (framed).

51 Amanda Rowell, Hany Armanious, Art Nouveau Barbeque (Sydney: Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, exhibition text, 10 July - 9 August 2003). 176

As with the Untitled hair drawings, the “sandpaper works” (Rowell) have been distinctively (but uniformly) framed: this time in a narrower white gesso-like frame with a very non-contemporary-looking pearl beading along the frame’s upper mid- section. The three-dimensional object quality of the framed work was again articulated through an unusual prop-hinge technique which gave the impression that the sandpaper was leaning (almost ad-hoc) against the backboard of the frame’s box cavity. This contemporary hinging sensibility seemed bizarrely at odds with the ornamental frame, creating one of the most intriguing framing packages that I have seen in recent years.

Although critical/conceptual engagement with the frame is unavoidable here (confirming the frame’s non-‘disengaged’ status), the tendency to approach and refer to the works as ‘sandpaper works’ equally reaffirms the frame’s non-‘intrinsicality’.

This is not to say that Armanious’ frames can be physically removed from the works without issue; rather, I make the point that ‘supplementary’ frames (like all ‘intracompositional’ frames) need to be acknowledged and respected as part of the aesthetic domain of the artist.

So despite Armanious’ frames being secondary to what they frame (the hair drawings and sandpaper rubbings), it would certainly seem incomplete to critique the contained works without also considering their frames.

I asked Hany Armanious how the frames came about:

IG: Could you say a bit about the thought process behind the frames for your Wall rubbings series: at what stage did you consult the frame-maker, and what was your brief or requirements? How did you want the frame to function in relation to the wall rubbings?

HA: The wall rubbings, for me, demanded a hanging vitrine of some kind. The idea was that they remain as objects whilst being housed in a wall mounted support. This was a way to emphasize their object hood and the process which brought them about but still let them have the illusion of the picture plane window. The mouldings for the frames were a composite of 177 various moulds that Charles Hewitt (the frame-maker) had in his workshop, and he was happy for me to combine a few to get what I was after. What I was after was something resembling ancient Hindu motifs that repeat and are a little unreasonable, hence the moulding wraps around the outer edge of the frame and suggests the shrouding of something holy.

IG: And the frames for the hair drawings?

HA: For the hair drawings, I wanted something from the art nouveau era and these were actually real mouldings from that time. I wanted to go for the art nouveau thing because that was the slant of the show which tried to conflate the psychedelic with the old world.52

The frames for Instruction (2004) [Figure 68] and Eyes on the Future (2004) by John Spiteri, shown as part of his New Paintings exhibition at Kaliman Gallery, Sydney, in 2004, could certainly be described as ‘intracompositional’. On the Kaliman Gallery website these frames are listed as being ‘artist’s’ frames,53 which is a term synonymous with ‘intracompositionality’.54 Whereas an ‘extracompositional’ frame can be described as being either ‘disengaged’ or ‘post-production’, an ‘intracompositional’ frame can be categorised as either ‘absolute’, ‘intrinsic’ or ‘supplementary’. And, as was the case with Armanious’ frames, Spiteri’s frames have all the hallmarks of ‘supplementaryness’.

52 Hany Armanious, email interview with author, 18-20 January 2008. Another reading of Armanious’ white gessoesque frame was triggered for me by an appreciation of the gessoing process common to many a frame’s production (during which numerous layers of gesso are applied to a frame and then painstakingly sanded back in order to achieve the required finish, thus resulting in an abundance of white gesso-encrusted sandpaper). However, this connection between the framed object (the sandpaper) and the production process (the sanding) proved overly speculative and coincidental. 53 See http://www.kalimangallery.com/web_pages/Frame_total.htm (and click on image) [10 May 2007]. 54 Many of the frames which Pearson refers to in his 1990 essay with regard to ‘intracompositionality’ have also been discussed by other writers as ‘artist’s’ frames. For example, Pearson writes about the ‘intracompositionality’ of Degas, Seurat and Rossetti’s frames. Paul Mitchell and Lynn Roberts discuss frames by these artists in the context of being ‘artist’s’ frames: see the chapter titled ‘Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - The Artist’s and Dealer’s Frame’ in their book Frameworks (London: Merrell Holberton, 1996), pp. 352-419. 178

Figure 68: John Spiteri, Instruction (2004), watercolour on paper, frame, 170 x 130 mm (paper size).

Spiteri’s works are both listed on the Kaliman Gallery website as follows:

JOHN SPITERI Instruction 2004 watercolour on paper and artist’s frame 17 x 13 cm

JOHN SPITERI Eyes on the Future 2004 watercolour on paper and artist’s frame 17 x 13 cm55

55 See http://www.kalimangallery.com/web_pages/Frame_total.htm (and click on image) [10 May 2007]. 179 Whilst the inclusion of the frame on the website caption implies ‘intracompostionality’, the implied symbiotic relationship between artwork (“watercolour on paper”) and frame (“artist’s frame”) asserts the frame’s non-‘intrinsic’ nature, thereby highlighting the frame’s ‘supplementary’ status. This is despite the watercolour (deceptively) accounting for only 15% of the total surface area within the outer dimensions of the frame - the rest being made up by the copper backing board onto which the paper is float hinged, the linen slip frame, and the actual frame.

By creating these frames, Spiteri is able to assert and retain control of the immediate setting for his watercolours. In doing so, a harmonious, portable and permanent relationship between artwork and frame has been achieved. The resultant frames provide the relatively small watercolour works physical presence and transportable aesthetic durability. In this respect, Spiteri’s frames serve many of the same functions as a traditional ‘artist’s’ frame: to colonise the area immediately surrounding an artwork in order to extend (semiotic) control of the work, and to communicate to potential owners or museum curators that the frame forms part of the artist’s aesthetic vision and is therefore not to be tampered with or replaced.

To be considered ‘supplementary’, a frame must significantly alter the semiotic or conceptual field of a work, taking it in a direction (under the artist’s guidance) to a place that it might otherwise not have gone. Bearing in mind the prominence of Spiteri’s frames, it would be difficult to dispute that these frames achieve this. His comments below reiterate the important role frames play in his work.

IG: What were you hoping the frames for Instruction (2004) and Eyes on the Future (2004) to add to the watercolour works? How do you see their function?

JS: There are many precedents throughout history of artists framing the two dimensional within architectural borders. Often this is an elaboration of a smaller idea which grows and extends onto the surfaces of a room. One such example is James Whistler’s Peacock Room (1877). Here his painting Princess from the Land of Porcelain (1863/4) forms the cornerstone of a room from which an interior environment extends, mirroring the sumptuousness of the picture. He has created for her an elaborate frame that 180 extends onto every surface of the room. The confinement of her framing becomes something that the viewer can experience spatially through the actuality of the room itself… Yet to be realised as complete interiors, Eyes on the Future and Instruction could represent a fragment of an interior design that is yet to be. As watercolours they become part of the theatre of the frame which aims for a complementary decorativeness. The containment of the frame is an escapist desire, in much the same way that an interior often embodies the utopian desires of its inhabitant.56

A more subtle and narrow ‘supplementary’ frame can be seen on Matthys Gerber’s Spirale (2005) [Figure 69]. This is made up of three butt-joined wooden strips (white, red and green) which are attached flush to the edge of his paint and inkjet canvas [see Figure 70]. The side-strips are not immediately recognisable as an attached frame and at first appear to be integral to the canvas. Realisation that the coloured pinstripe borders are formed by attached painted wooden side-strips does not, however, nullify their ‘intracompositionality’, but it does question the frame’s, now dubious, ‘intrinsicality’.

Figure 69: Matthys Gerber, Spirale (2005), oil and inkjet on canvas, framed.

56 John Spiteri, email interview with author, 12 - 16 November 2007. 181

Figure 70: Matthys Gerber, Spirale (2005), detail.

The stipulation that a ‘supplementary’ frame is conceived and developed separately from an artwork, often after its completion, and that it is seen as an important (rather than essential) part of the artwork, would indicate that Gerber’s frame is ‘supplementary’. The suggestion that the wooden strips form part of a ‘supplementary’ framing solution is further indicated on the reverse of the canvas [see Figure 71] where Gerber has handwritten:

“SpiRALE” MATTHYS GERBER 2005 OIL // INKJECT // COTTON

182

Figure 71: Matthys Gerber, Spirale (2005), text on reverse of canvas.

The absence of the frame here indicates that it was either conceived and attached after the completion of the painting, or that the frame is not considered essential for a description of the work.

Vitrines (Marc Quinn / Kate Rohde / Damien Hirst / Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro).

The vitrine is the primary museum display device which, from the standpoint of artists, suggests a number of significant practical, formal and conceptual possibilities. The most remarkable feature of the vitrine is its ability to transport its carefully ordered and labelled contents beyond the triviality and ephemerality of the everyday. At the outset the vitrine is intended to protect its contents both from dust and damage and from theft. It therefore provides artists with a convenient means of presenting works in less conventional, less durable media, and in this respect it is related to the box frame used for displaying assemblages and collages. However, the vitrine proper is usually much larger and can have a more assertive,

183 ‘sculptural’ presence within an exhibition gallery. The act of placing an object in a vitrine immediately focuses attention on it and suggests that it might also be both precious and vulnerable. The vitrine reinforces the notion of the unique, untouchable and unattainable and, perhaps significantly, has its roots in the medieval church reliquary. It therefore enhances the inherent visual power of an object to catch a viewer’s attention and to stimulate contemplation... Although the vitrine is essentially a frame, it also provides a carefully controlled and articulated environment. Its appropriation by contemporary artists coincides with their growing preference for delicate materials or potentially confrontational mixed media, the results of which need protective containment.57

As James Putnam has observed, contemporary artists have increasingly absorbed the vitrine into their work. This trend in many ways echoes the development of the nineteenth-century ‘artist’s’ picture frame: where the frame was colonised by artists to form part of their aesthetic realm, rather than (dis)regarded as a ‘parergonal’ border to be dictated by the artwork’s owner. It is now quite common for artists to take control of the design and production of vitrines. This not only occurs when the vitrine is being utilised to add critical or conceptual content to a work (such as when institutional or museological modes of presentation are being highlighted and critiqued), but also when the vitrine forms a less ‘intrinsic’ part of an artwork (such as when the vitrine is being employed more conventionally to simply protect and display a work). It is not possible, therefore, to judge a vitrine’s level of involvement with an artwork based solely on an artist’s level of involvement with the vitrine’s production, as there are various nuances of function that remain unexposed by such a basic and impatient approach. (Just because a vitrine has been designed and/or produced under the guidance of an artist does not necessarily mean that it is a crucial part of the artwork). In order to evaluate the relationship between a vitrine and what it contains, and to thus assess the vitrine’s relevance to a work, a more holistic approach is required. As with picture frames, vitrines are not all created equal.

57 Putnam, pp. 36-37. 184 Whereas a ‘supplementary’ frame augments an existing artwork to such an extent that it redefines the physical and conceptual boundary of the work, an ‘intrinsic’ frame goes one stage further and becomes so integral to an artwork that it is almost undistinguishable as a frame. An ‘intrinsic’ frame is therefore regarded as completely inseparable from an artwork. For example, Damien Hirst’s My Way (1990-91) [Figure 72] could be said to have an ‘intrinsic’ frame because it has an in-built presentation system rather than an attached frame added after the work’s completion. The glass- fronted medicine cabinet is so integral to this artwork, a description of the work could not omit the cabinet: the emphasis being as much on the container (the cabinet) as on the contained (the medicine).58

Figure 72: Damien Hirst, My Way (1990-91), old drug bottles, cabinet, 1370 x 1020 x 230 mm.

58 For an example of this see Kent, p. 38. Kent refers generically to this series of works as "Hirst’s cabinets". 185 To try and extract some of the functional nuances inherent within ‘intrinsic’ vitrines, I firstly compare Marc Quinn’s Self (1991) [Figure 73] and Eternal Spring (Lilies) I (1998) [Figure 74] with Kate Rohde’s Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior (2006) [Figure 75]. Secondly, I compare Damien Hirst’s The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991) [Figure 76] with Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro’s The Plastic Menagerie (2006) [Figure 77].

Self, 1991... is a self-portrait in blood. Nine pints of plasma, the amount contained in the human body, were taken from the artist’s veins over a period of five months. Poured into a cast made with dental plaster from his features, it was then frozen solid. The sculpture is serene, beautiful, but highly paradoxical. Form and content are indivisible, fused in an almost demonic bond. The piece is fundamentally unstable, dependent on a life- support system: unplug the refrigeration unit and the sculpture would melt into a formless pool. Rather than conferring immortality on its maker - as, by proxy, stone or marble would - it emphasizes the fragility and transience of life.59

Quinn followed up Self with a series of cut flowers frozen and displayed in immaculate stainless steel and glass vitrines. Eternal Spring (Lilies) I consists of a vase of funeral lilies suspended in time at their moment of optimum fluorescence. The active role played by the refrigerated vitrine creates an unusual and oxymoronic feeling of ‘kinetic- stasis’. Time appears (literally) frozen, but this is dependent on the (active) refrigeration equipment working effectively. Despite the formal elements such as the LED display on Quinn’s ‘scientific’ vitrine,60 it is predominantly the refrigerating function which makes the vitrine truly ‘intrinsic’. As with Self - which is never just nine pints of blood, but nine pints of frozen blood - Eternal Spring is never just a bunch of flowers, but a bunch of frozen flowers. The vitrine’s refrigerating function is so central to the artwork, that without it, the work would be both conceptually nullified and physically destroyed.

59 Kent, p. 73. 60 As it was described by Putnam in Putnam, p. 37. 186

Figure 73 (left): Marc Quinn, Self (1991), blood, stainless steel, Perspex and refrigeration equipment, 2080 x 630 x 630 mm. Figure 74 (right): Marc Quinn, Eternal Spring (Lilies) I (1998), lilies, stainless steel, glass, frozen silicon and refrigeration equipment, 2197 x 900 x 900 mm.

In contrast, it is ‘formal detail’ rather than ‘temperature control’ which is the key to the ‘intrinsicality’ of Kate Rohde’s vitrine in Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior (2006). With its laurel-leafesque festoons and garlands, dove crest/fronton, and floral embellishments, Rohde’s display case can be seen as the vitrine equivalent of a Rococo ‘trophy’ frame.61 This vitrine clearly functions differently to the generic, multipurpose, and readily transferable vitrines and display cases which punctuate standard contemporary museum/gallery interiors. In fact, Rohde’s vitrine functions quite differently to the white ‘disengaged’ gallery plinth on which it sits (part of the gallery furniture which achieves near invisibility when juxtaposed in such a way). Whereas the

61 See Figure 10 for an example of a Rococo ‘trophy’ frame. 187 white plinth recedes into the background, Rohde’s vitrine - steered by the artwork’s title Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior - actively courts attention: creating a kind of expanded focal point.

Figure 75: Kate Rohde, Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior (2006), polyester resin, faux fur, enamel paint, papier mache, rice paper, pastel paper, MDF, Perspex, co-polymer sealant, polyurethane foam, polystyrene, air-dry clay, tape, aluminium wire, sheet aluminium, glitter, 1130 x 910 x 685 mm. 188

Although Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior evidently references historical and museological modes of presentation, the contemporary materials used for the making of the vitrine and its context within a contemporary art gallery distances Rohde’s vitrine from equally ornate display cases found in some natural history museums. The vitrine is clearly part of Rohde’s aesthetic realm, not part of the gallery furniture, but to what extent is the work reliant on the vitrine?

The vitrine does not qualify as an ‘absolute’ frame because it contains a tangible part of the artwork - as denoted by the work’s title which defines the work in two parts: the “emerald cut vitrine” and its “luxury interior” (ie., a pair of turquoise-eyed owls, a diamante-encrusted mink, and an assortment of other faux-natural specimens). Removal of the frame would not therefore remove all trace of the artwork.

Equally, the vitrine does not qualify as ‘supplementary’ because although the title separates the vitrine (the “Emerald cut vitrine”) from its contents (the “luxury interior”), the vitrine is unusually prioritised, never secondary. The emphasis in the work-frame relationship is clearly different here than was the case with Hany Armanious’ Untitled hair Drawing #2-5 and his Wall Rubbing #6-17 [see Figures 66 and 67] where, as Armanious’ titles suggest, his ‘supplementary’ frames play a more auxiliary role to the hair drawings and wall rubbings. With Rohde’s title, Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior, attention is directed more evenly on the container and the contained.

Rohde’s Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior and Quinn’s Self and Eternal Spring (Lilies) I are therefore reliant on their vitrines in different ways. The removal of Rohde’s vitrine would nullify the work’s title and essentially destroy the artwork, whereas the removal of Quinn’s refrigerated display cases would result in his works melting and wilting.

Like the above examples by Rohde and Quinn, Damien Hirst’s The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991) also adopts a museological display aesthetic to give the impression of life suspended in time.

189

Figure 76: Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991), tiger shark, glass, steel, formaldehyde solution, 2130 x 5180 x 2130 mm.

Hirst’s four-metre tiger shark, preserved in formaldehyde, is positioned in a heavy-duty glass tank made by the same company that made the aquaria for Sea World in Brighton, England.62 The tank (vitrine/frame) functions here much as a display case might in a public Aquarium or natural history museum. It allows the viewer to get close to a previously dangerous creature, to look into its mouth and inspect its razor-sharp teeth, whilst simultaneously protecting the exhibited thing (the tiger shark) from the perils of being exhibited. However, Hirst’s vitrine ultimately differs from an aquarium or ‘extracompositional’ museum vitrine because it constitutes part of what is being presented: an inanimate but life-like tiger shark preserved in a tank of formaldehyde. The ‘intrinsicality’ of Hirst’s vitrine is continually reiterated by documentation of the work which invariably takes the vitrine’s outer edge as the dimension of the work: 213 x 518 x 213cm. Hirst’s vitrine, therefore, is as ‘intrinsic’ to The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living as a glass is to a glass of milk. And as with Quinn’s refrigerated vitrines, removal of Hirst’s vitrine would essentially destroy the artwork.

62 Kent, p. 37. 190 In 2006 at Gallery Barry Keldoulis, Sydney, Sean Cordeiro and Claire Healy exhibited The Plastic Menagerie (2006). This was listed on the gallery’s ‘list of works’ as follows:

The Plastic Menagerie 2006 pine vitrines and inflatable animals 300 x 230 x 195 cm63

The work consists of five inter-linked vitrines which each contain an inflatable swimming pool animal: a whale, a dolphin, a crocodile, an orca, and a chicken. As with Hirst’s The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (which Cordeiro and Healy’s work fleetingly resembles) the dimensions of the artwork are dictated by the container rather than the contained. The five vitrines thus form a very distinctive in-built presentation system for the work, thereby qualifying the vitrine configuration as ‘intrinsic’. Needless to say, it would be unthinkable for a collector to buy this work and then reframe it, or for a curator to invent an alternative method of displaying the inflatable animals.

Figure 77: Sean Cordeiro and Claire Healy, The Plastic Menagerie (2006), inflatable animals in vitrines, 3000 x 2300 x 1950 mm.

63 Gallery Barry Keldoulis, Sean Cordeiro and Claire Healy - Custom Living (Sydney: Gallery Barry Keldoulis, list of works, 1 - 24 June 2006). 191 Cordeiro and Healy’s five-part vitrine and Hirst’s vitrine appear, on a visual level, to be quite similar (in that they both contain animals, or representations of animals). On closer inspection, however, their functions clearly differ. Hirst’s vitrine is central to the ‘-frame’ animation of his pickled tiger shark, playing an active role in the shark’s preservation. In this respect, Hirst’s formaldehyde-filled vitrine has more in common with Quinn’s ‘life-support’ refrigeration vitrines which actively preserve their contents. Cordeiro and Healy’s vitrine configuration on the other hand is central to the elevation and construction of, as Simon Rees put it, “a monument to pop-cultural plastic disposability and signification”, and a monument to caricatured representations of Australianness from an overseas perspective.64 Although it is true that the five-part vitrine preserves its contents by prolonging the ‘life’ of the ‘disposable’ inflatables, this function is employed in a more humorous and ironic way by Cordeiro and Healy than it is by Hirst. Hirst’s vitrine is also more definitive in the way it separates the tiger shark from its surrounds. Cordeiro and Healy’s compartmentalised vitrine separates each inflatable animal whilst simultaneously connecting them to each other through the consistent design of the interlocking pine and Perspex boxes.

IG: What was the process leading up to the vitrine configuration for The Plastic Menagerie (2006) and how do you see its function?

CH/SC: The Plastic Menagerie is a portable museum vitrine complex designed to educate the public in zoology in the most cost effective manner possible. It is a combination of Ikea ideals and the cultural industry. The resulting units that house these inflatable animals are raw and reminiscent of the structures found in new housing estates worldwide. Whilst not having the finish a plinth or a vitrine would normally have, they are suggestive of museological cases. The cases are also marked with different colour markings indicating a system of how these pieces can be assembled. Like the Ikea flat-packable furniture the units can be collapsed and placed into its own crate ready for shipment. The vitrines came together in an organic fashion, as each of the inflatables were found at different times. Like an extension of a house, a new vitrine would be built accordingly. The five

64 Simon Rees, ‘The Artist’s Footprint: tracking the work of Claire Healy & Sean Cordeiro’ in Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro, small works by Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro (Berlin: Kunstlerhaus Bethanien GmbH, 2006); p. 56. 192 units are modular and fit into each other, whilst at the same time can be pulled apart and stand as individual vitrines encasing each creature. The use of vitrines in this work is somewhat ironic. The whole idea that these precious objects should be locked away in their own cases away from effects such as light, dust and contact is somewhat ludicrous, they are cheap ready-mades found in any department store.65

Plinths (Jim Lambie / Steven Gontarski / Lionel Bawden / Gareth Jones).

When the recent earthquake struck Seattle, I quickly called the museum and said, ‘Do I even have a museum to come to anymore?’ They said, ‘Everything’s fine. Only one object was damaged.’ I was always so preoccupied with the creative re-installation of collections that I realised the time had come to absorb the fact that there are practical realities that I am going to have to deal with for the first time on a daily basis; i.e. that every single object in the museum has to be on a special kind of plinth that can resist earthquakes...66

In recent years, the traditional and more obvious functions of the plinth (to raise an artwork to a particular height, to prevent an artwork from being kicked or damaged, and to segregate and present an artwork) have been augmented in a number of unique and interesting ways by various contemporary artists. The plinths discussed below by Jim Lambie, Steven Gontarski, Lionel Bawden and Gareth Jones illustrate how artists have incorporated the plinth into their work, making the plinth unquestionably an intra- artistic component - if not always ‘intrinsic’ then certainly ‘supplementary’ to the work.

Many of the characteristics which define Pearson’s ‘intracompositional’ frame can again be seen here: as with the late nineteenth-century picture frame (and the previously discussed vitrine), the plinth has also been the focus of sustained critique and colonisation by artists keen to control the ‘immediate’ physical setting for their work.

65 Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro, email interview with author, 25 September - 17 December 2007. 66 Lisa Corrin (Curator and Deputy Director of Art at Seattle Art Museum from 2001 - 2005) in Susan Hiller and Sarah Martin (eds), The Producers: Contemporary Curators in Conversation (3) (Newcastle: BALTIC in collaboration with the University of Newcastle, 2001), p. 93. 193

In contrast to the generic white gallery plinth, which usually exists in a disattended void beyond the boundary (and listed dimensions) of an exhibited artwork, the artist- controlled plinths by Lambie, Gontarski, Bawden and Jones articulate the edges of their associated artworks quite differently. Each plinth, however, in its own way exposes an ambiguity over what constitutes the physical limit of the work, thus making neat inside- outside distinctions problematic.

The relationship between plinth and artwork has been further complicated in recent years by subtle changes to the traditional white gallery plinth. The current trend for unpainted or roughly painted plinths (made from MDF, plywood, particle-board, and plaster-board) may be seen as a rejection of the pure white plinth and its now staid and conformist connotations. These new coarser plinths are more in keeping with the brash, irreverent and edgy sensibilities of much contemporary art, as well as being more suited to (ie., less visible in) non-white exhibition spaces, such as warehouses and disused shops, which frequently form the backdrop to temporary exhibitions. In such settings, these plinths often serve much the same purpose as traditional white plinths do in ‘white cube’ settings, and might therefore be viewed as an evolved form of ‘disengaged’ plinth.

The proliferation of curator-controlled exhibitions and the related increase in highly aestheticised exhibition design can also, on occasion, make it difficult to ascertain whether a plinth is an integral part of an artwork, or whether it is ‘extracompositional’ and/or part of exhibition design.67 A subtle cross-fading between artwork and exhibition design can be seen in the display of Brancusi sculptures at the Guggenheim, New York (1998/9) [Figure 78] as well as in Lionel Bawden’s exhibition at Dunedin Public Art Gallery, New Zealand (2003/4) [Figure 79].

67 A test of ‘intrinsicality’ here would be to question whether a plinth/base is dismantled after an exhibition, or whether it is transported, stored and exhibited with (as part of) the work in the future. 194 From a viewer’s perspective, both displays raise questions about where the presented artworks stop and where exhibition design cuts in, and who is controlling what.68

Figure 78: Display of Brancusi sculptures in the rotunda lobby, Guggenheim Museum, New York, as part of Rendezvous: Masterpieces from the Centre Georges Pompidou and the Guggenheim Museums; 14 October 1998 - 24 January 1999.

68 Exhibitions such as Julie Ault and Martin Beck’s Installation (2006) and Outdoor Systems, Indoor Distribution (2000), and Powered Up, Reassembled (2000), organised and designed by Julie Ault, have actively explored the boundaries between exhibition design and art installation. With regard to the plinth-like forms which made up part of the design for Powered Up, Reassembled, Ault has stated that they had multiple functions: “these structures were at once pedestals, platforms, seating, furnishings, sculptural elements, and display surfaces”, see Julie Ault and Martin Beck, Critical Condition (Cologne: Kokerei Zollverein, 2003), p. 275. For images and descriptions of Outdoor Systems, Indoor Distribution (2000) and Powered Up, Reassembled (2000) see David Dernie, Exhibition Design (New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 2006), pp. 164-167 and 174-177 respectively. 195

Figure 79: Lionel Bawden’s the spring tune exhibition at Dunedin Public Art Gallery, New Zealand (2003/4).

Within the past twenty years there has been a few notable exhibitions which have addressed the issue of the plinth and its relationship to the artwork. In 1989, as part of the Artist’s Choice series at MoMA, New York, Scott Burton continued his interest in dissolving the boundaries between art and design by famously installing Brancusi sculptures independent of their pedestals, whilst also presenting the pedestals separately as works in their own right.

Surely, after the 1989 Burton-organized MoMA exhibition of Brancusi’s pedestals ("Artist’s Choice: Burton on Brancusi"), we cannot look at them in the same way. They too are sculpture. Beginning midway down the ramp, imagine the sculptures on other pedestals, standard or fanciful, and you will immediately understand that the pedestals had became integral. Late in life, Brancusi labored on them more and more, and at the risk of seeing every one of his artworks as a column of sorts, it is illuminating to see the pedestals as not separate from the carving or bronze at the top. His sculpture became a higher form of stacking… Brancusi obviously wanted to control how his carvings were displayed by insisting that the pedestals were also the work. This is equivalent to a painter insisting that the frame is part of the art.69

69 John Perreault, ‘Brancusi’s Place’ (2004) in Artopia: John Perreault’s art diary, at http://www.artsjournal.com/artopia/2004/06/brancusis_place.html [19 May 2007]. 196

In 1990, British artist Richard Deacon was asked by the Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburg, to create an interface between the museum and the museum’s collection. As part of the Carnegie International 1991 Deacon created three ‘islands’ - one from tread- plate, one from laminated and carved wood, and one from vinyl flooring - which formed the platforms for presenting other objects [see Figure 80]. More recently, in the exhibition Image and Idol: Medieval Sculpture (2001/2) at Tate Britain, in collaboration with medieval historian Philip Lindley, Deacon was involved in creating a series of ‘post-production’ plinths for medieval sculptures; again questioning the role of what sits directly underneath the object being shown [see Figures 81 and 82].

Figure 80: Richard Deacon, Facts Not Opinions (1991), detail. Laminated and carved wood ‘island’ by Richard Deacon, supporting gilt and lacquer centre table attributed to Louis Le Prince-Ringuet and Marcotte (circa 1855-60), a bronze cast of Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux’ Genie de la Danse (1869), and a silver berry spoon from the Gorham Company (no date).

197

Figure 81 (left): Image & Idol, installation view. foreground: tomb of Sir Thomas Andrew and his two wives (circa 1555-64). Figure 82 (right): Image & Idol, installation view. foreground: double effigy of Armoured Knight and Lady (circa 1325-35).

And in 2005/6 at the Rodin Museum, Paris, Antoinette Le Normand-Romain curated Sculpture in Space: Rodin, Brancusi, Giacometti.

... about one hundred works by Rodin, as well as others by Brancusi, Bourdelle, Giacometti and Louise Bourgeois, including more recent pieces by Didier Vermeiren and Richard Wentworth, focus on the question of how to support a sculpture... Sculpture, by its very nature, requires a support of some kind. The primary function of a pedestal is to serve as an intermediary between the work and the ground, and in this way, to enhance it. It can also contribute to giving further meaning to the sculpture to the point of actually becoming a part of it.70

The question of whether a plinth is being employed by an artist as a device for simply presenting and drawing attention to an ‘autonomous’ sculpture, or whether it is intended to form a constituent part of an artwork seems easy to answer for a sculpture like Jim Lambie’s Psychedelic Cockatoo (2005) [Figure 83]. This work consists of an enlarged

70 Rodin Museum, Sculpture in Space, Rodin, Brancusi, Giacometti (Paris: Rodin Museum, press- release, 17 November 2005 - 26 February 2006). 198 version of a ceramic bird ornament, which has then been paint-spattered by Lambie and lowered down onto a plinth made up of twenty upright aerosol cans with their spray nozzles facing outwards. The weight of the ceramic bird produces a blast radius of colour which slowly dissipates as the spray cans empty. The ephemeral enamel mist at the base of the sculpture is reminiscent of a rocket-launch that gently fizzles out, or a bird taking its last outward breath. In the process, the spray cans leave an exquisite trace of the sculpture’s installation or placement.

Figure 83: (In foreground) Jim Lambie, Psychedelic Cockatoo (2005), ceramic, enamel paint, spray cans, duct tape. Dimensions variable. Psychedelic Cockatoo is shown here forming part of Lambie’s installation The Kinks (2005). 199

Lambie’s temporarily kinetic or ‘active’ plinth clearly falls within the boundary of the artwork. In fact the aerosol base is almost unrecognisable as a plinth. It is so ‘intrinsic’ to the sculpture that it ceases to be seen as a mode of presentation, and becomes part of ‘the presented’. Confirmation of this is provided by the way the artwork is listed and documented. When exhibited as part of the exhibition at Tate Britain in 2005, where it formed a constituent part of Lambie’s mixed media installation The Kinks (2005), gallery wall labels listed the component parts of Psychedelic Cockatoo as being: ceramic, enamel paint, spray cans, and duct tape.71 Consistent with the requirements for an ‘intrinsic’ frame, the materials which make up the plinth for Lambie’s Psychedelic Cockatoo are (invariably) included in the work’s list of materials.

Although the plinth could be described as a ‘once-only’ plinth (ie., if the work was to be re-shown, the plinth would need to be renewed and the act of lowering the ceramic bird onto it would need to be re-staged) this does not reduce the ‘intrinsicality’ of the plinth, nor its resultant ‘intracompositional’ enamel paint halo on the floor, because without these elements, Psychedelic Cockatoo would cease to be complete. The aerosol spray emitted from the plinth thus alters the physical boundary of the work, blurring or tapering the work’s edge, providing a fluxus dynamic to an otherwise static inanimate object.

Although no work dimensions were made available to visitors at Tate Britain, the dimensions to a similar work titled Night Owl v Day Glo (2005) [Figure 84], exhibited at The Modern Institute in Glasgow as part of Lambie’s installation The Byrds (2005), were listed on the gallery website as follows:

Height 132cm (length and depth dimensions variable).72

This indicates that the “variable” enamel spray on the floor is an ‘intrinsic’ and necessary part of the work, and therefore an essential element which encapsulates

71 The duct tape refers to the black tape holding the aerosol cans together rather than to the (vinyl) tape on the floor, which was listed as a separate work: Chromatic (Cross-hatch and Corners) (2005). 72 http://www.themoderninstitute.com [23 May 2007]. 200 Lambie’s stated desire to engender immediate sensory pleasure in the viewer when encountering his work.73

Figure 84: Jim Lambie, Night Owl v Day Glo (2005), ceramic, enamel paint, spray cans, duct tape, 1320 mm (height), dimensions variable (length and depth).

Steven Gontarski’s sculptural bases/plinths negotiate an equally complex physical boundary for his artworks. Although alluding to sculptural convention and a traditional artwork-plinth relationship, Gontarski’s graffiti-sprayed plinth for Speed I (1999/2000) [Figure 85] is heavily and ‘intrinsically’ involved with the artwork, forming an in-built presentation device and constituting a very obvious part of what is being presented.

73 See http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize/2005/jimlambie.htm [23 May 2007]. 201

Figure 85: Steven Gontarski, Speed I (1999/2000), fibreglass, spray paint, 1956 x 635 x 470 mm.

Rather than functioning by presenting an object or sculpture to a viewer and then receding back from the viewer’s attention, Gontarski’s plinth is hard to ignore. It would be unthinkable to document, describe or critique Speed I (1999) without including the graffitied plinth. What we see is not an object on a pedestal, but a graffitied object.

Traditional artwork-plinth distinctions, however, are encoded within the sculpture on more than one level, leading to (momentary) ambiguity and a playful re-examination of the work’s edge. As the following question from Catherine Wood to Steven Gontarski in UK-based magazine Untitled testifies, habitual approaches are difficult to shake off:

CW: Have you ever made work where the graffiti artist has worked on the sculpture itself? SG: No. Originally I was going to do that, but I quickly realised that graffiti artists do use frames of a kind. They choose blank spaces. They’re not really

202 into going over someone else’s tag. There is a protocol of graffiti and I wanted to stay within that. It’s not about defacing. It’s about making a mark and pushing unique styles. The way I see it is if a musician asks another person to rap over a track its still that musician’s track, but they’ve added a different texture. Obviously the way that texture is added is under the control of the person making the song. So I want to do the same thing.74

Despite the encoded bluff provided by the assumption that graffiti artists never work on top of the work of other artists, it would be difficult to argue that the graffiti-sprayed plinth in Speed I is somehow beyond the perimeter of Gontarski’s work. Gontarski’s aerosol-sprayed plinth, like Lambie’s aerosol plinth for Psychedelic Cockatoo, forms an integral and inseparable part of the artwork and its content, and can therefore be seen as a prime example of an ‘intrinsic’ plinth/frame.

However, as the following example highlights, it can not be assumed that all ‘artist’s’ plinths are ‘intrinsic’. In 2004 in the open-air setting of the Economist Plaza, London, Gontarski exhibited Prophet Zero III (2003) [Figure 86]: a red high-gloss lacquered fibreglass sculpture on a 1.5m custom-made oak plinth. Ambiguities arise when considering the role of the oak plinth in relation to the fibreglass sculpture and to the site of presentation, especially when considering that the same sculpture, and others from the same series, have been exhibited and documented in different circumstances minus the oak plinth [see Figures 87 and 88].75 With this in mind, it would appear that in the context of the Economist Plaza, the oak plinth is a ‘supplementary’ inclusion employed to mediate physical and conceptual space between sculpture and site, a necessary mode of presentation and protective requirement for the sculpture’s temporary open-air setting. The oak plinth elevates the hybridised human-figure, thus highlighting (separating) it as something to be contemplated, whilst simultaneously, through assimilation, binding it to other public sculptures within the vicinity of the Economist Plaza.

74 Catherine Wood, ‘Steven Gontarski Interviewed by Catherine Wood’ in Untitled (Spring Edition, 2001), p. 19. 75 Gontarski exhibited Prophet Zero I (2003) at Karyn Lovegrove Gallery, Los Angeles, in 2003/4 without any additional support. 203

Figure 86: Steven Gontarski, Prophet Zero III (2003), fibreglass, oak plinth. Economist Plaza, London.

204

Figure 87 (left): Steven Gontarski, Prophet Zero III (2003), fibreglass, 2150 x 567 x 577 mm. Figure 88 (right): Steven Gontarski, Prophet Zero I (2003), 2150 x 567 x 577 mm. Karyn Lovegrove Gallery, Los Angeles.

In contrast to Gontarski’s ‘intrinsic’ aerosol-sprayed plinth in Speed I, the oak plinth for Prophet III meets all the criteria to be considered ‘supplementary’. Not only was the oak plinth conceived and developed separately from the fibreglass sculpture, Prophet Zero III is also regularly listed and documented without the plinth. This can even be seen in the context of the Economist Plaza project - the online press-release listing the work as follows:

Prophet Zero III, 2003 Fibreglass 84 5/8 x 22 5/16 x 22 11/16 in. (215 x 56.7 x 57.7 cm)76

Both materials and dimensions, again, reaffirm the artwork as a fibreglass sculpture, thus implying that the oak plinth, as well as the site of presentation, are auxiliary components: factors which are no doubt wholly relevant to the Economist Plaza project,

76 http://www.contempart.org.uk/economist/econ_arch24.htm [23 May 2007]. 205 but which are not deemed sufficiently ‘intrinsic’ to Prophet Zero III to transcend that context. In other words, Prophet Zero III could be transported to another site, shown without the oak plinth, and still be considered whole.77 The same could not be said for Gontarski’s Speed I (minus its graffiti-sprayed plinth) or Lambie’s Psychedelic Cockatoo (without its spray-can plinth), both of which are entirely dependent on their plinths to be considered whole.

Similar ambiguities between ‘intrinsicness’ and ‘supplementaryness’ are at play when considering the plinths of Lionel Bawden. Inevitably, the following questions arise: is the plinth being employed simply as a device for presenting and drawing attention to its associated sculpture, or does it form a constituent and irremovable part of the artwork? and how is it possible for an ‘artist’s’ plinth to effectively communicate to a viewer where a work starts and finishes?

Floated to shin-height on their eccentric plinths, the sculptures insisted that you crouch down to meet them... Bawden also bestows a gift of glamour on what are usually merely functional objects - plinths. Diamonds of colour above open raw-wood frames, they lend the works an air of performance, a dance-floor feeling.78

Bawden is best known for using coloured pencils as the base material for his varied assortment of sculptural forms [see Figure 89]. These have mutated over time from representational forms (such as river stones and phalluses) to more abstracted forms which are harder to pin down, but which might be described, accordingly, as molecular- like structures, meditative temple-like objects, domestic-scaled mountain ranges, and hybridised amorphous-looking forms which appear part geological and part sci-fi.

77 This obviously does not remove the oak plinth or the Economist Plaza site from an interpretation of Prophet Zero III and its installation in that specific instance, rather this hypothesis is a means of comparing contextual differences between one setting and another, thereby establishing what in essence constitutes Prophet Zero III as it moves from place to place. 78 Justin Paton, Lionel Bawden: the spring tune (Dunedin, NZ: Dunedin Public Art Gallery, exhibition brochure, 6 December 2003 - 29 February 2004), unpaginated. The plinths being discussed here can be seen in Figure 79. 206 Figure 89: Lionel Bawden, esque - thoughts brought forth by our fingers (2000-02), 18 forms (coloured pencils, epoxy), installation view. GRANTPIRRIE Gallery, Sydney.

Bawden’s recent body of work, The Monsters, is perhaps the most ambitious in theme and certainly the most expressive in form. Having taken his inspiration in part, from a cult Polish Sci-fi novel, ‘Solaris’, written in 1961 by Stanislaw Lem, from which the exhibition takes its title, Bawden was mesmerised by the concept of a ‘thinking ocean’ upon planet ‘Solaris’ which, through the complex motion of its surface, gives rise to monstrous ‘independent creations’ called Extensors. Stretching for miles between membranous walls swollen with ‘ossified growths’ the ocean’s ability to ‘think’ creates canyon sized formations, triggering subconscious memories in those who examine its behaviour… Whilst these sculptures are somewhat unassuming in size, Bawden’s creations grow to be macroscopic in theme – incarnations of science; planetary surfaces; the fluctuations of the subconscious.79

79 Claire Lewis, Lionel Bawden: The Monsters (Sydney: GRANTPIRRIE, gallery brochure, 2004), unpaginated. 207 In 2006, Bawden exhibited a single work from the monsters series in a group exhibition called Ghosts of the Coast at Gallery 4A, Sydney. The work was listed on the gallery room sheet as follows:

4. Lionel Bawden the monsters (like some colossal python which after swallowing a mountain is sluggishly digesting the meal), 2005, coloured Staedtler pencils, epoxy, linseed oil. Plinth of metal, MDF and perspex.80

The inclusion of the plinth (and its materials) on the ‘list of works’ reaffirmed that the plinth was an ‘artist’s’ plinth: part of Bawden’s aesthetic realm rather than an intrusive curatorial whim or ‘post-production’ exhibition design beyond the artist’s control. But the exact relationship between plinth and object still needed to be unraveled.

Figure 90: Examples of Bawden’s Monsters series with Hammerlok plinths.

80 Gallery 4A / Half Dozen, Ghosts of the Coast (Sydney: Half Dozen, list of works, 27 April - 24 May 2006). 208 The plinth construction was made from Hammerlok (a DIY material normally used for constructing shelving units and workbenches) which had been topped with a blue sheet of Perspex. On top of the plinth, which measured 50 x 90 x 60cm, was one of Bawden’s exquisitely crafted sculptures made from coloured pencils. As I walked around the artwork doing a semi-conscious but customary search for the artwork’s numbered label (in order to marry it up with the number 4 on the ‘list of works’) I was confused to find - unlike all the other works in the show - that no such label was visible. Another circuit of the artwork, scanning walls and floor, confirmed this. As my attention then turned to what I considered to be the work (the hybridised object on a bench-like construction) I was surprised to eventually find the work’s number 4 label on the Perspex surface of the plinth. The effect of this was disconcerting, as it is unusual for numbered stickers or gallery labels to be placed on actual artworks, but customary for these to be fixed to ‘disengaged’ gallery plinths. The implication here being that, at least in the mind of the person in charge of placing the numbered labels, the relationship between Bawden’s plinth and the sculpted object was less than osmotic: a separation between the two had been made. Such an emphasis on the placement of gallery labels may seem pedantic, but this can contribute to the defining of an artwork’s edge for gallery visitors: one message among many.

Contributing to the non-‘intrinsicality’ of Bawden’s plinth is the fact that other sculptures from the monsters series are regularly photo-documented with the plinth cropped from full view (and without the addition of ‘detail’ added to the photograph’s caption) [see Figure 91], or with the plinth missing completely [see Figure 92]. The removal or editing out of the plinth may appear to be equivalent to an act of amputation, but it is not (as we can see from these examples) completely unthinkable.

209

Figure 91: Page from GRANTPIRRIE gallery brochure which presents the monsters (like some colossal python which after swallowing a mountain is sluggishly digesting the meal) (2004) with the plinth cropped from full view, and the plinth’s materials and dimensions omitted from the caption.

210

Figure 92: the monsters (sun in my mouth) (2004) presented on polished concrete floor at www.grantpirrie.com/GRANTPIRRIE/Lionel_Bawden_2004/lb03.shtml [23 May 2007].

IG: Could you say a bit about how the plinths for the monsters series came about and how you see them functioning in relation to the pencil sculptures?

LB: For my exhibition ‘the monsters’, the plinths were conceived very much as part of the work, rather than just a display table for the sculpture on top. I wanted to put the object under examination, even in the absence of a viewer, inferring the sense of an examination table or scientific slab. The title ‘the monsters’ and some of my thinking about the work, comes from the Stanislaw Lem Sci-fi novel ‘SOLARIS’. I saw the narrative of the scientists observing the natural phenomenon of the ‘Thinking’ planet Solaris, (it’s surface covered by a sentient ocean) as a parallel reading to notions of an artist trying to observe the nature of a material… Artist Tony Cragg once described pencils as existing within a class of objects - ‘thinking 211 materials’ with which we collaborate to express ideas… This notion of pencil as ‘thinking material’ resonated with the sentient ocean of Solaris, an enormous pool of matter in which endless sublime, monolithic eruptions come under scientific scrutiny… I wanted the plinth to act as observer, a stand-in for scientific scrutiny, artistic reckoning and the eyes of the audience. For this reason I used the reflective surface of coloured Perspex as the skin to the plinth, so that the form was always being reflected (an inferred kind of viewing) and questioned. The form of the plinth itself is a mass produced workshop shelving system or workbench, which I have cut and adapted. I like the idea that the plinth makes reference to the shed or the studio - a place of action and transformation. The form of the bench also references storage shelves in museums so the object becomes archived and under a different kind of scrutiny. Within the works ‘the monsters’ the pencil forms themselves remain primary to the work, however I was keen to use the plinth as a means to extend the form, to introduce other ways of looking and considering the work… The reflection of the pencil forms in the Perspex (inferred lake/ocean), echoes this doubling process which to me is a kind of suggestion that doubling and redoubling is a particular kind of scrutiny in itself, a kind of looking and re-looking.

IG: For your Dunedin show, you exhibited various small sculptures on coloured open-sided plinths. Were these plinths conceived especially for that exhibition, and what happened to the plinths after the exhibition finished?

LB: The plinths for ‘the spring tune’ were conceived by me specifically for the show during my residency at Dunedin Public Art Gallery and designed by me under discussion with the construction team working at the gallery, who built them for me. The plinths were a diamond form when viewed from above, echoing a pattern used in three optical wall-works that I made for the show. So on one level the diamond form was a way to link wall and floor. The large diamond shaped plinths were arranged to intersect at points and map out a large diamond grid on the gallery floor, suggesting that the geometry inside the works was also being played out in the installation and the world at large. 212

The sense of labour involved in creating the work has always been one aspect essential to its reading - the accumulation of small gestures over time; the spirit of repetition as a process of making sense of the world (thinking and re-thinking/ looking and re-looking)... The form of the plinths was an open frame structure similar to the wooden skeleton of a house. Some of the early inspiration from this series of work came from looking at the colours and patterns of crocheted rugs, traditionally the domain of women’s craft so I wanted to introduce an element which spoke of more traditionally male labour. Whilst remaining inessential to the reading of the objects themselves, this reference to an entirely different mode of construction was another attempt to suggest the importance of structure and geometry in the evolution of the work and the notion that form is very often dictated both by everyday and more esoteric concerns.

At the completion of the exhibition three of the works were collected by Dunedin Public Art Gallery. Two of the plinths formed part of the acquisition, two small landscapes on one plinth and one large pod form on another, corresponding directly to their installation in the exhibition. Due to the large scale of the plinths the remaining four were not shipped to Australia and the other sculptural elements of the show were split up and entered private collections. As opposed to the plinths which form an essential element of ‘the monsters’ series, the plinths for ‘the spring tune’ were conceived as installation elements primarily for the exhibition and were not suitable for domestic spaces, which was the destination for many of the collected pieces.

When making small scale sculpture, the ‘problem of the plinth’ usually always comes into play. Although a simple white plinth can exist as a kind of ‘dumb’ (silent/invisible) solution to locating a work, certain questions become essential to making sense of an object in space. Why is this sculpture sitting on another form as opposed to sitting directly on the floor? How does the material of the plinth effect the primary sculptural element? What is the shift in physical engagement with the work dictated by the scale of the plinth? Generations of artists have been engaged in this ‘problem of 213 the plinth’, notably Brancusi, Borgeois and Rodin and I think it is commonplace and almost essential to engage in finding your own answers to this dilemma when making any object. The comodification and sale of small sculpture, dictates other outcomes and unless an artist is very specific and careful, small sculpture often exists in opposition or conversation with other objects ‘on the mantle’ in domestic display. Some of my forms have specific relationships to their plinth, not necessarily essential to the reading of the object itself, however, providing the object with a larger or clearer thinking space around it; a platform or stage in which the object can speak uninterrupted. When I want to preserve this relationship between sculpture and plinth, the plinth is sold as part of the work and the buyer is encouraged to follow this mode of display. With smaller, more discreet works I find this is less important (something to do with my own sense of scale relationships between objects) and the object can converse with other objects in space, an opportunity for the collector to set up different dialogues between forms.81

Although Bawden’s Hammerlok and Perspex plinth for the monsters (like some colossal python which after swallowing a mountain is sluggishly digesting the meal) cannot be considered ‘intrinsic’ in a pure sense, it is certainly ‘supplementary’. It forges a symbiotic relationship with the primary sculpted object and, in doing so, fundamentally alters the semiotic field of the artwork. In keeping with Bawden’s interest in Tony Cragg’s idea of ‘thinking materials’ and with the monsters... reference to Lem’s thinking ocean in ‘Solaris’, the plinth’s Perspex surface reflects and perpetually examines the wooden sculpture. The plinth thus elbows out a richer more controlled physical and conceptual space for the work than had its mode of presentation been left to ‘post-production’ chance.

The question of how a plinth relates to the thing which it presents implodes somewhat when looking at a recent series of plinth-like works by Gareth Jones which literally display themselves.

81 Lionel Bawden, email interview with author, 17 - 25 October 2007. 214 I first started using the plinths to get over a problem I had in my work, which is that I didn’t like plinths and I wasn’t interested in reinstating the baggage that they carried. To me that seemed like a very conservative way of presenting something, a way of maybe giving a fake aura to an object - as if the plinth or the frame could somehow give something to the work that it didn’t have already. I think my work very much comes out of an idea that the work should stand for itself in some way - so a plinth becomes just a useless support. But at the same time there was a group of objects I’d made that literally couldn’t stand by themselves, so I needed some form to help me show them. For the oldest work in the show, which is called ‘Open Plinth’, I chose the plinth format really as a way of combining the object and the means of presentation, the thing being presented and the means of presentation, in one go. And that became the series.82

Jones’ Modular Plinth (2003) [Figure 93] goes beyond being considered an ‘intrinsic’ frame (an integral and inseparable part of an artwork) and becomes an ‘absolute’ frame (“the thing being presented and the means of presentation, in one go”). Consistent with all ‘absolute’ frames, removal of Jones’ plinth would remove all trace of the artwork: Modular Plinth would cease to exist. The plinth thus undergoes a promotion of sorts; it becomes a fetishised object, and sole focus of attention.

... for ‘Modular Plinth’, I wanted this work to look as if it had arrived from outer space, as if it had never really been touched by a human hand. I found a furniture maker, who was recommended to me, and I said I want this piece to look like it’s come from outer space. And he said ‘Well, I don’t know about that, but we can make it look German’. So he gave it to a German person within the company to make.83

82 Gareth Jones (2005) in Gareth Jones: Interviewed by Jon Wood at http://www.axisweb.org/dlFULL.aspx?ESSAYID=24 [20 September 2006]. 83 Ibid. 215

Figure 93: Gareth Jones, Modular Plinth (2003), stained and lacquered plywood, dowel pegs. 6 parts: installed at 900 x 300 x 300 mm.

Shaun Gladwell / Hilary Lloyd. With screen-based artworks (DVDs, videos) the extent to which the means of presentation or delivery system can be considered part of the work obviously varies a great deal. Some screen-based works are more durable than others and can be viewed in infinite contexts on just about any hardware - as long as the image is visible, and the sound (if there is any) is audible. Other works require a more specific mode of presentation, and the screen-image and hardware become elements in a larger sculptural and/or immersive installation.

216 Despite artist Ian Haig’s assertion that “Media art exhibitions can appear like a Sony showroom”,84 it would be equally accurate to describe the majority of audio-visual equipment within contemporary museums and galleries as existing within a quasi- invisible disattended void: the fact that a work is shown on a Sony plasma screen rather than a Pioneer LCD screen, or that it happens to be an old Sony monitor rather than a new one, is often considered circumstantial or irrelevant for a satisfactory understanding of a work. Focusing in on this one aspect, the physical encasing of the monitor is materially and visually present but - as with a ‘disengaged’ box frame - it slips quietly from attention (obvious parallels can be made here between how a screen image interacts with its formal mode of presentation, delivery system or ‘housing’, and how a painted image might interact with its physical frame). In such instances, the monitor is seen as a way of presenting the work, a container for the moving image, but it is not regarded as integral to the work. The following answer from Bill Viola to a question posed by Sasha Grishin encapsulates this mindset:

SG: If I understand you correctly, you are more concerned with the electronic memory of the piece than with its physical expression in any given moment in time. BV: Yes, but in actual fact I am saying more than this. There is beginning to appear a kind of generation gap with collectors and collecting institutions in regard to media art, where the younger generation has no problem with this notion but the older generation is troubled by it. For example, take this cup of tea in front of us. Which is more important to you, the tea or the cup? Those experienced in digital media would say the tea. For them the cup is just a temporary vessel. Ownership of the information is more important than owning the object. The tea can be transferred to another container if the existing one becomes damaged or worn out. The critical point is that the tea needs to always taste and appear the same as it does to us at this moment no matter what cup it will be in, and this is where issues of care, conservation, and technological knowledge come into play, just as they do with conventional forms of art. Until now, arts institutions have based their whole approach to conserving the image by preserving the material object,

84 See Darren Tofts, ‘As happy as a pig in art’ in RealTime (No. 73, 2006), p. 29. 217 so I think we’re in for some interesting times ahead as media art continues to proliferate.85

Although the physical components associated with presenting video/DVD artworks are commonly employed by artists and institutions to fulfill semiotically inert roles - acting as ‘disengaged’ delivery systems - this is not always the case. Below I look at artworks by Shaun Gladwell and Hilary Lloyd which have reversed this tendency for new media hardware to be ignored. By viewing these works (which, broadly speaking, are all portraits) through a framing filter, their mode of presentation and surrounding audio- visual equipment can be discussed in the context of being examples of ‘artist’s’ frames.

Among the twelve works by Shaun Gladwell in his solo exhibition MMVBREAKLESS SESSIONS at Sherman Galleries, Sydney, in 2005, were three works which were listed on the gallery room sheet as follows:

Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) 2005 DV/DVD 17:56 min, edition of 4 Performer: Virginia Maddock

Study I - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) 2005 DV on PSP Gaming Unit 5:32 min, unique state

Study II - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) 2005 DV on PSP Gaming Unit 4:55 min, unique state86

Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) was exhibited as a projection onto a wall inside a partitioned cavity which usually functions as a closed-off storage space within the main gallery [see Figure 94].

85 Sasha Grishin, ‘Bill Viola in Conversation’ in Art & Australia (vol. 43, no. 2, 2006), p. 265. 86 Sherman Galleries, Shaun Gladwell - MMVBREAKLESS SESSIONS (Sydney: Sherman Galleries, list of works, 30 June - 23 July 2005). 218

Figure 94: Shaun Gladwell, Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) (2005), DV/DVD, 17:56 min, edition of 4 (projected on back wall). Study I - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) and Study II - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) can be seen to the right of the cavity entrance.

The digital video featured a young female skateboarder practising (rather than performing) moves against a beach backdrop. The work’s context of presentation, in a space usually out of view or ‘out of bounds’ seemed fitting for Virginia’s slightly unpolished performance, and perhaps hinted at the clichéd notion of skateboarding as a subversive, counter-culture or marginal activity. However, as an edition of four, it is impossible for all versions of Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) to claim this setting as an ‘intrinsic’ part of the work. In fact, it is inevitable that this work will, at a later date, be projected onto a different wall or presented on a flat screen monitor.

219 IG: How flexible is the method of presentation for Virginia by the Sea (Bondi)? Obviously the way in which this work was installed at Sherman Galleries in 2006 was a bit of a one off, but as an edition of 4, what display options do you see as being feasible without compromising the work? Is it essential, for example, for the work to be a projection, or could it be shown on a monitor (and if so, would it need to be a particular type of monitor)?

SG: The work you are describing is a project in several parts. There is the projected work, Virginia by the Sea (Bondi), and exhibited in addition to this projected single channel are two ‘studies’ that I display specifically on PSP gaming systems.

The studies were editioned works - like the single channel video - however the key difference between the video edition and the PSP studies is that the video is handed over as media (DVD + master) to be played on a number of delivery systems (ie., projection, LCD screen, etc), whereas the studies are linked to their PSP delivery systems, (ie., the PSP is linked to the work physically). There are of course ways in which to transfer the media to other displays/monitors etc, but this would be against the intended delivery of this work. As with all my videos, I suggest equipment that will optimise the viewing of the work but with the PSP works there are no options other than the PSP units themselves.

The projected video is a very specific type of digital video - HDV format, and there is no soundtrack with the piece. It plays silently and the equipment I suggest is based on studio tests with various projectors. Although the work is intended for projection, this is not always possible for the custodians of the work to carry out - although, in a public exhibition, I state that the work needs to be projected rather than delivered on a monitor.

Currently, my video editions consist of: screening copy of the work on standard DVD; archive copy of the work on digital tape; certificate of authenticity; hand-coloured video still, framed; all packaged in a Pelican Case.

220 Currently my PSP editions consist of: Sony PSP + power supply; memory stick containing video data in the PSP; archive memory stick with video data; instruction manual; certificate of authenticity; all packaged in a Pelican Case. These are the physical packages of work before they are activated through a delivery system.87

So in contrast to the projected version of Virginia by the Sea (Bondi), the hardware specifications are more defined for Study I and Study II [Figure 95]. With these works, the implication is that the PSP gaming unit is far from a ‘temporary vessel’ (as Viola put it earlier) for showing digital video. It would be more accurate to describe Gladwell’s PSP gaming unit as a semiotically ‘active container’.88 The ‘intrinsic’ nature of the gaming unit is reaffirmed by its inclusion as an itemised component of the artwork on the gallery’s ‘list of works’.

Figure 95: Shaun Gladwell, Study II - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) (2005), DV on PSP gaming unit, 4:55 min.

87 Shaun Gladwell, email interview with author, 10 December 2007 - 25 January 2008. 88 Ray Smith uses the term ‘active container’ with regard to Howard Hodgkin’s painted frame for Dinner at Smith Square (1975-79), see Ray Smith, The Artist’s Handbook (London: Dorling Kindersley, 2003), p. 340. 221

By incorporating the PSP gaming unit into the artwork, Gladwell thus excerpts control over the ‘immediate’ context of presentation for Study I / II... and creates an ‘intracompositional’ picture frame which adds to the content of the work from outside the picture (ie., the digital video image). Like a picture frame, the PSP gaming unit mediates the image and instructs the viewer how to approach what it contains. Connotations of youth pastimes, repetitive practice, and the obsessive pursuit of perfection, are compounded in both frame and moving image.

IG: Could you elaborate a bit more on your use of the PSP gaming units for Study I - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) and Study II - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi)?

SG: The studies for Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) are linked to the media physically and conceptually. The fact that the system used for delivering the video is also a gaming unit is a key signifier for me and suggests Virginia is a figure read in relation to an avatar in the world of digital gaming. The work may or may not invite the reference to popular such as Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, etc, however the PSP is a way to extend these possible readings, whilst also experimenting with the unit itself, which is rendered dysfunctional as a gaming unit by playing non-interactive single channel video.

My interest in skateboarding as a logic of re-thinking the intended design of civil objects and public space is reflected in the use of this unit. The PSP is appropriated as a delivery system for art, just as a park bench or handrail might be appropriated for skateboarding. Function is an ongoing concern within my practice. Since this project I have used PSP units to deliver works for similar reasons - the suggestion of a controllable avatar that is uncontrollable - the technology of gaming dumbed down technically and slowed down in order to focus on the fact that the gaming unit now presents documentation of an activity it is designed to simulate.89

89 Shaun Gladwell, email interview with author, 10 December 2007 - 25 January 2008. 222 The relationship between screen-image and audio-visual equipment is also explicit in the video portraits of Hilary Lloyd [see Figure 96].

Figure 96: Installation view of Hilary Lloyd’s solo exhibition at Chisenhale Gallery, London, 1999.

Lloyd chooses to display her videos on industry-standard equipment, which in itself acquires the material presence of a sculpture within the exhibition space. She uses professional monitors in box-like metal casings which she installs on Unicol units, functional television stands with a single chrome column... Cool and silent, the monitor units closely resemble Minimalist sculptures, and Lloyd uses them very much to achieve the same effect as artists such as Robert Morris - namely, to heighten the viewers’ phenomenological awareness of their position in space in relation to the art object.90

90 Jan Verwoert, ‘Body Language’ in Frieze (Issue 102, October 2006), pp. 220-221. 223 In 2000 at Grey Matter Contemporary Art, Sydney, Lloyd exhibited Colin (1996), and as Gallery Director, I was involved in facilitating this. The formal specifications for the presentation of Colin were, as expected, fairly precise. The work was to be shown on a Sony PVM - 20N5E video monitor, using a Pioneer V7300D video/DVD player, on a Unicol single column television stand - or very near equivalents. For logistical reasons, the equipment was to be sourced in Sydney by the gallery, but it was always clear that Colin was not to be exhibited on unspecified equipment that had not been agreed upon by the artist. Rather than being seen as a ‘disengaged’ or ‘supplementary’ means to present a video, the audio-visual equipment was always regarded as ‘intrinsic’ to the work: an integral and essential part of a video-sculpture, and an in-built presentation system.

224 Chapter 4: Exploring the ‘Extended’ Physical Frame.

Frames Within Installations and in Series. As Claire Bishop points out in her book Installation Art (2005), there are similarities and differences between ‘installation art’ and ‘an installation of art’:

What both terms have in common is a desire to heighten the viewer’s awareness of how objects are positioned (installed) in a space, and of our bodily response to this. However, there are also important differences. An installation of art is secondary in importance to the individual works it contains, while in a work of installation art, the space, and the ensemble of elements within it, are regarded in their entirety as a singular entity. Installation art creates a situation into which the viewer physically enters, and insists that you regard this as a singular totality.1

Although the line between ‘an installation of art’ and ‘installation art’ is sometimes blurred - look for example at Jim Lambie’s installation The Kinks (2005) which was essentially an ensemble of individually titled artworks by Lambie [see Figure 83] - a distinction between the two is still often valid. Most, if not all, retrospective or survey exhibitions would qualify as installations of art, even when the mode of installation or exhibition design plays a ‘supplementary’ function to the individual artworks on display.2

Similarly, it would be hard to argue that Dave Muller’s solo exhibition Thirty-Three* Revolutions (*And One Third) at The Approach, London, in 2005 was anything other than an installation of artworks, despite the slightly unconventional hang of Muller’s thirty-three (and one a third of the size) large-scale watercolour paintings [see Figures 97 and 98].

1 Claire Bishop, Installation Art (London: Tate, 2005), p. 6. 2 Bill Henson’s 2005 exhibition at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, is an example of this. For this exhibition, the lighting in the gallery was unusually subdued in order to enhance the light (and darkness) within Henson’s photographs. The darkened gallery, to an extent, extended the darkened space within the photographs beyond their ‘immediate’ frames. I have used the term ‘supplementary’ above to suggest that Henson’s mode of installation was not entirely ‘disengaged’ from the installed artworks, but also to suggest that the mode of installation was not sufficiently ‘intrinsic’ to the individual artworks to transcend that particular exhibition. 225

Figures 97 and 98: Dave Muller, Thirty-Three* Revolutions (*And One Third) (2005), installation view, The Approach, London.

226 Each watercolour is a detailed representation of a spine from a music album which, Muller claims, has changed his life. These abnormally long and narrow framed watercolours were strategically placed around the gallery (horizontal and vertical) following a personalised time-line of Muller’s evolving musical influences. Despite the suggestion of sequential narrative, and the overt relationship of each watercolour to Muller’s record collection and to the concept of the exhibition as a whole, the result was not sufficiently homogeneous to warrant the exhibition being defined as installation art, proper. It would be more accurate to say that Thirty-Three* Revolutions (*And One Third) constituted an installation of a series of artworks; and as with any series, each individual work should be considered in the context of that series, even if it is later separated and appreciated in isolation from the other works.

The consistent style of frame used for Muller’s watercolours acts as a subtle visual clue or reminder of this, linking each of the watercolours to other works within the series (part of the collection), whilst offering each work the option of being appreciated on its own. The frame therefore functions not only by connecting each work to other works beyond the frame, but also by elevating each unique work for separate contemplation.

The fact that frames ‘look out’ as well as ‘look in’, that they ‘separate’ and ‘bind’, is also evident in Gareth Jones’ Seven Pages From a Magazine (1975 - 2001) exhibited at Platform, London, in 2002 [see Figure 99]. With this work, we move further into the muddy waters between an ‘installation of a series of framed images’ and ‘pure’ installation art.

GJ: ... ‘Seven Pages From a Magazine’ used a series of adverts for Lambert and Butler cigarettes from the mid 1970s, which showed a group of people in a kind of perpetual early summer evening drinks party, smoking Lambert and Butler cigarettes and being generally stylish in stylish interiors. And again, I wanted to somehow charge a space, this time with the social environment depicted in those adverts, and for that, in a way, to be the content of the work, the thing that would have an impact on the viewer... At the opening it was as if there were two sets of people drinking and talking, one on the other side in the fictional realm of the adverts and one in the real space of the gallery.

227 JW: ... with the Lambert and Butler installation, the metal frames surrounding each image echoed the Lambert and Butler packet depicted inside, is that right?

GJ: Well it’s a bit like the return of the repressed again, because it was the framing question... I didn’t want to use plinths and I didn’t want to use frames, but they became things that reappeared almost by default as a necessary means to get work across. So the magazine pages had to be framed for it to survive as a work, for it to exist at all. Having realised that I was going to have to frame them, then it became a kind of game to think of the most stylish way possible to frame them. And so I chose one that echoed the fake brushed aluminium packaging of the cigarettes and ran with it in perhaps quite an obvious way.3

Figure 99: Gareth Jones, Seven Pages From a Magazine (1975 - 2001), detail, framed magazine pages, dimensions vary with each installation.

3 Gareth Jones (2005) in Gareth Jones: Interviewed by Jon Wood at http://www.axisweb.org/dlFULL.aspx?ESSAYID=24 [20 September 2006]. 228 Jones’ brushed aluminium frame thus refers to what is inside the frame (the Lambert and Butler cigarettes and the stylish scene) as well as to what is beyond the outer-edge of the frame (the other identical frames within the series and their context of presentation). The frames therefore hint at the outward aesthetic to which Jones states he was trying to achieve through the display of the magazine advertisements.

Although the (literal) framing of the advertisements and their display in a gallery context alludes to an installation of artworks, Seven Pages From a Magazine could more accurately be described as an art installation, because the logic of the work insists that the viewer inhabits and participates in the artwork rather than experiences it from beyond its edge(s). The inward dynamic of each frame is still at play, but this is counter-balanced by the artwork’s overt contextual dynamic.

The use of identical frames to link a series of works together also explains (in part) the use of ‘signature’ frames by some artists. A ‘signature’ frame can be described as a unique or identifiable style of frame that has been developed and used consistently by a particular artist and which occasionally, as a result, takes on that artist’s name. For example, the ‘Whistler’ frame describes a specific type of cluster-reeded cushion and plain frieze profiled frame developed in the nineteenth century by artist James Abbott McNeill Whistler. Although in recent years the move towards more minimal frame profiles has reduced the chances of a particular frame profile being assigned to one specific individual, some contemporary artists still develop distinct framing styles. So much so, that it is occasionally possible to identify an artist (or at least the difference between two artists) based purely on the framing specifications of their work.4

Although there are numerous examples of installations which in someway incorporate ‘immediate’ frames, below I will focus on three quite varied examples: Barry McGee’s 2005 installation Easy Tonto at Modern Art, London; Jake and Dinos Chapman’s 2005 exhibition Like a dog returns to its vomit at White Cube, London; and Chris Ofili’s The Upper Room, first shown in 2002 at , London, and later at Tate Britain, London, from 2005 - 2007.

4 Chris Ofili’s use of elephant dung props are a clear example of this. 229 The press-release for Easy Tonto introduced Barry McGee as follows:

McGee is better known in the street art community of San Francisco by his graffiti tagging moniker ‘Twist’; but with his recent move towards museum and gallery installations, the artist has found a new audience for his work... McGee is a clear and defiant voice in the persistent underground visual language that narrates the cityscape of San Francisco. His cult status within the street art community combined with a relevant and conscious understanding of his subject matter has allowed McGee to move confidently into gallery and institutional contexts. Using the same energy and frankness seen in his street works, McGee creates intricate environments within the exhibition space that are punctuated with the detritus of city excess.5

Modern Art (the gallery) is in a pocket of London which predominantly consists of small industrial units and ‘lock-up’ spaces. The area’s streetscape gives very few clues as to the sprinkling of white-walled galleries which have sprung up there in recent years. The locale has an air of small business and light industry: more taxi cab mechanic than commercial art gallery. This semi-industrial, semi-desolate, atmosphere made the approach to McGee’s exhibition/installation Easy Tonto feel all the more ominous.

Written in large red aerosol letters across the front of the gallery were the words ‘SMASH THE STATE’ whilst an upturned transit van with its rear doors flung open blocked the gallery entrance [see Figures 100 and 101]. To enter the gallery, visitors had to enter the van and pass through its side door. The van thus functioned as a door frame and transitional zone - like a decompression chamber between ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ - whilst the ‘SMASH THE STATE’ graffiti on the exterior of the gallery provided a contemporary echo of Daniel Buren’s Within and Beyond the Frame (1970).

5 Modern Art, Barry McGee - Easy Tonto (London: Modern Art, press-release, 9 September - 30 October 2005). 230

Figures 100 and 101: The entrance to Barry McGee’s exhibition Easy Tonto at Stuart Shave / Modern Art, London, 2005.

231 Inside the gallery was a sprawling installation of McGee’s intricate geometric paintings, a mechanised graffiti-spraying mannequin in a modified shipping container (not shown in images), banks of flashing screens, customised lightboxes, and clusters of framed pictures which bulged forward from the walls like boils [see Figures 102 - 105].

Figures 102 and 103: Barry McGee, Easy Tonto (2005), installation view. 232

Figures 104 and 105: Barry McGee, Easy Tonto (2005), installation view.

233 The diaristic clusters of drawings, photos, and signs that McGee places in old thrift store frames and arranges on the walls of his installations give one the feeling of reading a visual journal... And, in fact, the source of inspiration for these assemblages of framed images occurred while on a trip to South America... He found himself in an old church filled with thousands of carvings made by individuals who had painted or carved a personal inscription on each of them. One wall contained clusters of small framed images holding drawings of people, places, cars. He learned that once a year people made pilgrimages to this church and left these items behind. Moved by the pureness and directness he found imbued in these offerings, he decided to begin framing the accumulation of drawings he had been making for years and hanging them in groups on the walls of his studio. These assemblages of framed sketches of the haphazard details of life, drawn on whatever was available at the time - newsprint, magazine images, even music notation paper - began finding their way into his museum and gallery installations. Fragmented and yet fundamental, these groupings of framed drawings reflect the accumulative (and sweet) nature of urban,

contemporary life.6

McGee’s use of ‘immediate’ frames is notable because by clustering the frames together and having them overlap each other in such a way, he undermines the frame’s authority as ‘gatekeeper’: control of the edge is lost. Within the congealed mass of frames, the ability of each frame to elbow out physical space for its contents is thrown into question. In McGee’s hands, frames impede each others space, they form a (dis)orderly queue and wait for their turn to be seen, they obscure as well as display, but more than this, they form something which is greater than the sum of its parts. Like a mirror-ball, where each individual mirror is regarded as fairly insignificant in isolation but remarkable en masse, McGee’s frame-clusters divert attention away from individual works towards an overall accumulative effect, a collective ambience or general mood.

6 http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/mcgee/card1.html [20 September 2006]. 234 In Jake and Dinos Chapman’s exhibition Like a dog returns to its vomit [see Figures 106 - 109] the ‘collective’ versus ‘individual’ dynamic was more evenly balanced: ‘immediate’ frames were used in groups as compositional elements, this time to create pictorial images, but attention was only momentarily diverted away from the contents of each frame. On one wall, an image of a dog defecating was produced using eighty-three framed etchings, whilst on the opposite wall a dog (again made up from a series of eighty-three framed etchings) was seen to be vomiting or, alternatively, eating its own faeces. Each group of etchings was listed on the gallery’s ‘list of works’ as an individual series: Gigantic Fun (2000) [Figure 107] and Disasters of War IV (2001) [Figure 108]. The title of the exhibition came from Jake and Dinos Chapman’s more recent series Like a dog returns to its vomit (2005) which, according to the ‘list of works’, consisted of “eighty reworked and improved etchings from Francisco de Goya’s ‘Los Caprichos’”. This series of works occupied the centre of the gallery and had a more conventional (ie., non-figurative) hang.

Figure 106: Jake and Dinos Chapman, Like a dog returns to its vomit (2005), exhibition view, White Cube, London.

235

Figure 107: Jake and Dinos Chapman, Gigantic Fun (2000), eighty-three framed etchings, installed as part of Like a dog returns to its vomit (2005), White Cube, London.

Figure 108: Jake and Dinos Chapman, Disasters of War IV (2001), eighty-three framed etchings with watercolour, installed as part of Like a dog returns to its vomit (2005), White Cube, London. 236

Figure 109: Jake and Dinos Chapman, Disasters of War IV (2001), detail, eighty- three framed etchings with watercolour, installed as part of Like a dog returns to its vomit (2005), White Cube, London.

Through the sheer quantity of work, and the manner in which it had been displayed, the gallery acquired the feel of a giant colostomy bag for the Chapmans’ seemingly endless stream of ideas; a dumping ground for their numerous clashing influences: Goya, children’s dot-to-dots, Nazis, rainbows, ghosts, clowns, children’s colouring-in books, skulls, McDonald’s etc. The defecating dog and vomiting dog depicted by the framed etchings hinted at the excesses to be found within the etchings. The etchings’ ‘immediate’ box frames, on the other hand, allude to (and are consistent with) a more reserved museum-style mode of presentation, where etchings are displayed in a straight line at eye level. The Chapmans’ decision to use a fairly conservative ‘immediate’ frame is not only fitting for etching as a medium, it also subtly reasserts the seriousness of their project and helps to prevent it from appearing overly derisive.

The dual perspective of this exhibition (that it was necessary to view the installation from a distance as well as to view the individual works close up) added a unifying dynamic often missing from more conventional installations of artworks, particularly of etchings, where the autonomy of the individual work is elevated, even celebrated. In 237 contrast, with this installation, pronounced neurological-like pathways had been created between the defecating and vomiting dogs and the Like a dog returns to its vomit series of etchings, with these connections being clearly signposted by the unifying title of the exhibition. The two dog images created by the framed etchings forced (or enticed) the viewer to stand back and view each series as a unified whole, and to view the exhibition as a singular composition. The viewer was thus physically embroiled within and conceptually engaged with the Chapmans’ immersive and ‘intracompositional’ installation of the framed etchings before being within comfortable focal range of the contents of each ‘immediate’ frame.7

Although the Chapmans created a heightened awareness of the etchings’ mode of installation, it was difficult, however, to ignore the individual framed works. There was still definitely a sense that the etchings constituted the exhibition. This was aided by pointers from the wider ‘circumtextual’ frame: press-releases, publications and media coverage of the Chapmans’ exhibition tended to focus wholly on the origin of the etchings and their doctored content rather than on their mode of presentation.8

Despite the height and orientation of each framed etching having been to an extent dictated by the bigger picture, it seemed to me that most gallery visitors were quite content to look at works which had been hung diagonally or which were abnormally close to the floor or ceiling. The fact that the hanging strategy encouraged an increase in distance between artwork and viewer did not, in this instance, seem to seriously undermine the ‘immediate’ frame’s ability to draw the viewer in to what it contained.9

However, the traditional notion that a frame functions purely to segregate and encourage internality, to purely separate, is again questioned here. The Chapmans’

7 I have used the term ‘intracompositional’ here firstly because its imprecise nature is useful in this instance (it would be problematic to define the Chapmans’ method of installation as either ‘intrinsic’ or ‘supplementary’ because it is obviously ‘intrinsic’ to the overall installation of the etchings, but ‘supplementary’ to the experience of each etching), and secondly because the term ‘intracompositional’ seems appropriate in recalling artists such as Degas and Seurat and their attempts to control the ways in which their works were experienced through the use of idiosyncratic frames. (I am of course implying here that the Chapmans’ mode of installation / exhibition design acts as an ‘extended’ frame). 8 Neither the press-release for Like a dog returns to its vomit nor the accompanying publication mention the distinctive installation of the etchings; and previous series have similarly been presented in publications as portfolios of etchings: see Jake Chapman and Dinos Chapman, Like a Dog Returns to its Vomit (London: White Cube, 2005) and Jake Chapman and Dinos Chapman, Insult to Injury (Gottingen: steidlMACK, 2003). 9 This is not to ignore the artwork’s ability to draw attention to itself, but rather an acknowledgment of the part that the ‘immediate’ frame plays in orientating the viewer towards the work. 238 ‘immediate’ frames never fully detach their contents from the greater whole: the ‘inside’ of the frame always seems to coexist with the ‘outside’. Separation and connection occur simultaneously. The frames separate individual units of information (the etchings) like spaces between words, but when composed in such a pictorial way, the framed etchings form part of a larger unit of information, a kind of sentence. The ‘immediate’ frames thus - through uniformity and their overt role in a bigger composition - refer to what sits beyond their outer edge, pulling something extra into their border, and allowing the exhibition design to negotiate a fittingly brazen conceptual space for each etching.

In Chris Ofili’s The Upper Room the relationship between his paintings, their ‘immediate’ frames (the elephant dung props), and the very prominent ‘extended’ physical frame (the actual room in which the paintings were presented) is equally compelling [see Figures 110 and 111].

Figure 110: Chris Ofili, The Upper Room (Tate version, 2005-7), 13 paintings in room designed in collaboration with architect David Adjaye, installation view.

239

Figure 111: Chris Ofili, Mono Gris (1999-2002), oil, acrylic, glitter, graphite, fibre tip pen, elephant dung and polyester resin on canvas, with map pin and dung props, 1832 x 1228 mm (canvas dimensions). Mono Gris was a constituent part of The Upper Room.

The Upper Room could be described as a series of thirteen paintings by Ofili in a room designed in collaboration with architect David Adjaye. The thirteen paintings each feature a monochromatic monkey intricately rendered by Ofili’s in his trademark style of dots and resin layers. Each painting is titled accordingly: Mono Negro; Mono Rosa; 240 Mono Gris; etc. Six paintings were positioned on one wall, six on a facing wall, and the thirteenth and largest canvas was installed at the head of the room. The timber-lined room was accessible via a long and dimly lit corridor (also timber-lined) which not only accentuated the feeling of entering a different space but also provided a transitional zone which allowed the eyes and ears of the viewer to adjust to the darkened hush of the room. The only light in the room was provided by ceiling spotlights strategically placed to bathe each painting in a reverent glow, but leave the rest of the room in relative darkness. Ofili describes the installation as follows:

The Upper Room is like a single entity, and it’s really one painting consisting of thirteen parts in a room; and it’s the Last Supper. It’s the twelve elements with the thirteenth most important element, focal point. In The Upper Room you could sit down and contemplate. You needn’t at times look at the paintings, it was a lot to do with the atmosphere that was suggested in the paintings, just being in that space.10

The thirteen paintings in The Upper Room were propped against the room’s walls supported on balls of elephant dung. Ofili has been using elephant dung as a propping device for his paintings (as well as directly in his paintings) since the early nineties.

Following Ofili’s visit to Africa, he produced the first paintings which incorporated the dung balls. They were principally experiments in something between a destruction of and a distraction from an increasingly polite and dangerously unfashionable decorative painting style which betrayed Ofili’s inevitable vulnerability to the seductive nature of an unashamed aesthetic harmony... Ofili’s decision to use elephant dung was in itself a manoeuvre of some shrewdness given that it gave adequate offence to despoil any criticisms which might have placed his work in the generally exhausted modernist tradition where it could be sustained only through formalism. It also enabled the artist to remain true to his aesthetic orientations... By introducing this earthy ignoble substance into his work he

10 Chris Ofili in Chris Ofili (UK: Illuminations, video recording, 2004). 241 deviated away from something too pictorially comfortable and imbued it with a wealth of cultural baggage.11

In The Upper Room, the elephant dung props on which Ofili’s paintings sit, not only act as ‘intracompositional’ frames, they also act as ‘intracompositional’ title plaques: the title for each painting being spelt out in coloured map pins on the props. Where it is often the role of a work’s title to create a rich metaphorical ‘frame’ of associations for an artwork, here we see that responsibility alleviated (in part) by the presence of the elephant dung. This potent sign-bearing frame provides a rich mix of cultural associations through which to view the paintings. Ofili’s elephant dung props therefore help to conceptually orientate his paintings, as well as physically control their ‘immediate’ mode of presentation.

On a physical level, the use of the dung props communicates (and dictates) that the canvases are not to be hung on a wall or (re)framed at a later stage by a curator or collector. In the context of The Upper Room, however, the impact and function of the dung is somewhat obscured by the relationship between the paintings and their imposing ‘extended’ frame: the chapel-like room.

The use of physically immersive frames by Ofili are, he states, an attempt “to create an atmosphere for people to feel somehow out of themselves”.12 By creating a harmonious environment in which to present his paintings - by effectively taking the viewer into the frame - there is less of a jolt between the world of each painting and the world outside of that painting. The experience continues beyond the edge of each canvas:

And that [the effect of the painting] can go beyond the frame somehow, that when you turn around to move away from looking at that painting, you’re in a space that supports or enhances that experience.13

11 Godfrey Worsdale in Lisa G. Corrin, Stephen Snoddy, and Godfrey Worsdale (eds), Chris Ofili (London: Serpentine Gallery and Southampton City Art Gallery, 1998), p. 2. 12 Chris Ofili in Chris Ofili (UK: Illuminations, video recording, 2004). 13 Ibid. 242 Where Degas and Seurat attempted to control the ‘immediate’ settings for their paintings through the use of specially designed ‘intracompositional’ picture frames, The Upper Room could be described as an attempt by Ofili to control the ‘extended’ setting for his paintings through the creation of an immersive ‘intracompositional’ frame. This echoes (perhaps amplifies) the persistent desire of artists to take control of the frame. Whilst the contemporary colonisation of the frame may not necessarily point to a hostile demarcation battle between artist and collector (as was the case in the nineteenth century), it may well represent a perceived lack (by contemporary artists) in the effectiveness of the ‘isolated’ artwork, and a growing need to somehow supplement it with controlled exhibition design and creative installation methods.

Artist-Controlled Experiments With the ‘Extended’ Frame. Below, I look at two contemporary art practices which have explored and experimented with the ‘extended’ frame: UK-based artist collective BANK (1991-1999), and Polish- born UK-based artist Goshka Macuga. These practices have been selected because they both incorporate artworks by other artists and knowingly encroach upon exhibition design and territory ordinarily defined as curatorial.

What distinguishes these contemporary practices from the majority of artists from previous generations who were also intent on shifting the focus from work to frame (such as Joseph Kosuth and Daniel Buren) is that they both create ‘extended’ frames which explore the work-frame relationship rather than (or as well as) create artworks which highlight an existing ‘institutional’ frame.

Whilst there are examples of artists who in the past have created what could be termed immersive ‘intracompositional’ frames - Donald Judd’s project in Marfa, Texas [see Figure 16], and Marcel Broodthaers’ Musée d’Art Moderne - Département des Aigles (1968-72) [Figure 34] being two prominent examples - the current exploration of the ‘extended’ frame by contemporary artists is particularly pertinent today due to the proliferation of independent/co-dependent curators since the mid-nineties and the effect that this has had on the contemporary art landscape. Not only has this growth area resulted in an abundance of small curated group exhibitions, it has also fuelled (and simultaneously been fuelled by) a perpetual stream of large international biennials, triennials and mega-exhibitions. The push by contemporary artists to explore and

243 harness the ‘extended’ frame allows for a critique of, and possibly resistance to, aspects of the ‘extended’ frame which might be regarded as increasingly beyond their control.

By looking at artist-controlled exhibitions and installations which incorporate artworks by other artists, it is possible to consider framing from a dual perspective: firstly, it is possible to look at how the individual works of the participating artists have been framed; and secondly it is possible to consider how the overall installation or exhibition has been framed.

It was during the mid-nineties that London-based artist collective BANK organised a number of conspicuous group exhibitions - most notably Zombie Golf (1995) and Cocaine Orgasm (1995) - which offered a complete antidote to the way artworks were being shown in London at that time.

... we made our OWN SPACE in the world and IT WASN’T LIKE ANYONE ELSE’S ... it was one we could CONTROL, so we weren’t stuck making art CONTROLLED by OTHER PEOPLE. We made gallery spaces, some for days, some for months, some for years: we made art TOGETHER as a group, and we made shows that were our ART. We had TOTAL CONTROL of EVERYTHING, art, artists, publicity, funding, aesthetics, so

each show was BANK’s WORK.14

The ‘space’ that BANK created was antagonistic, convoluted, of-the-moment, and quite brilliant. Having secured funding for a large group show in 1994, and having gained the use of the second floor of a loft-style building which was undergoing renovation, BANK organised Wish You Were Here. Although this was not BANK’s first exhibition, it was the first time that it felt as if they were really on to something. Most of the invited artists were familiar names outside of the BANK context, so it was easy to make comparisons between what BANK were doing and how those same artists were being (re)presented elsewhere. Although with Wish You Were Here there was still a sense that this was an exhibition of individual artworks, there was definitely a feeling that the boundaries between the works were beginning to be broken down. Distinctions between the installation of the artworks and the renovation of the building had also started to

14 BANK; BANK (London: Black Dog Publishing, 2000), p. 1. BANK’s use of upper-case in quotation. 244 blur. Unlike the ‘white cube’ experience, or the standard warehouse exhibition for that matter, with BANK, the artworks were integrated, overlapped, and forced into intimate relationships with one another.

What Wish You Were Here had hinted at in 1994, Zombie Golf delivered in 1995 [see Figures 112 and 113]. With this exhibition, the artworks of the invited artists were practically consumed by the exhibition. BANK’s life-size model zombies lurched around the gallery getting in the way of the installed works whilst creating the mood of a B-grade horror movie. With the gallery theatrically converted into a golf course, and looking more like a low budget film or stage set than an art gallery, Zombie Golf was a significant rejection of the distraction-cleansing tendencies prevalent in contemporary art in London at that time.

If Zombie Golf was a themed group show - and a large part of its appeal was that it did sound like one, in the guise of fictional film or pulp horror novel - how was the invited artist to address this theme? They didn’t have to at all, really, as our zombie figures took care of it by making the artworks read as background props whose individual details could be seen as secondary... this was a BANK movie... an uneasy balance was struck between the work

of the (overbearing) curators and the (sidelined) curated.15

Figure 112: BANK, Zombie Golf (1995), exhibition view, Bankspace, London.

15 Ibid., p. 20 and p. 21. 245

Figure 113: BANK, Zombie Golf (1995), exhibition view, Bankspace, London.

BANK quickly followed up Zombie Golf with The Charge of the Light Brigade (1995) and Cocaine Orgasm (1995) [see Figures 114 and 115]. In doing so, they created a style which could be described as a provocative mix of post-Duchampian exhibition intervention16 fused with the anti-establishment stance and irreverence of the Sex Pistols.

16 I am thinking here of Marcel Duchamp’s installations/interventions at the International Exposition of Surrealism held in Paris in 1938 and at the First Papers of Surrealism held in New York in 1942. 246

Figure 114 (top): BANK, Cocaine Orgasm (1995), exhibition view (works in image by BANK, Janette Parris, and Rebecca Warren), Bankspace, London. Figure 115 (bottom): BANK, Cocaine Orgasm (1995), exhibition view (works in image by Chris Ofili, Michael Stubbs, Tim Allen, Stephen Glynn, BANK, Max Wigram, and David Burrows).

247 Although by this stage BANK were increasingly being thought of as a curatorial enterprise rather than a group of artists, BANK rejected this, claiming that “everything we did was art, with curating being just one part amongst others in our operation”.17 A curatorial perspective does, however, provide a useful filter through which to view their process of exhibition-making, and it offers an established framework to assess their contribution and significance to the presentation of contemporary artworks.

If we compare the challenging viewing context created by BANK with a more conventional ‘curatorial/exhibition’ frame (which would ordinarily be responsive to, respectful of, and directed by selected or planned artworks), we can see a few key departures in BANK’s approach. With BANK, the harmonious relationship between artwork and frame was, to an extent, nullified and rendered arbitrary. BANK’s ‘curatorial/exhibition’ frame was not responsive to or directed by individual artworks, it created its own logic. It encircled, but it did not frame. The agency usually associated with an act of framing was still there, but it was present as an act of ‘anti-framing’. Rather than creating an appropriate physical and conceptual space for individual artworks, BANK’s frame devoured them. Space was compromised rather than negotiated. The individual artworks of invited artists were treated almost as after- thoughts. The exhibition in its entirety (including the exhibition container, the promotion of the exhibition, the social dynamic, and the incorporated artworks) became the centre of attention.

Despite this, BANK’s project could not be regarded as an anti-framing operation per se. Strategic and effective framing was occurring, but this was concerned with negotiating the appropriate physical and conceptual space for BANK’s meta-work (the exhibition) rather than the works within. This was achieved through a fairly sophisticated and experimental interaction with (and manipulation of) the ‘circumtextual’ frame. These actions were numerous and varied, but included: the regular (re)branding of their gallery space (initially Bankspace, then DOG, and finally Gallerie Poo Poo); brash graphic design and quirky flyers for exhibitions (the invitation card for Cocaine Orgasm was a charity Christmas card); ranting and occasionally offensive press-releases (BANK also critiqued other galleries’ press-releases - correcting spelling mistakes and grading them accordingly - before faxing them back to the relevant galleries); slap-dash exhibition

17 BANK, p. 37. 248 catalogues (the ring-bound catalogue for Space International (1991) was put together a couple of days before the opening); and the publication of thirty-four issues of their own tabloid newspaper The BANK (1996/7).

For their exhibition FUCK OFF (1996), BANK blazoned ‘BEWARE OF THE DOGS’ across the windows so that the outside of the gallery looked hostile and unwelcoming. They also partitioned off most of the gallery behind an austere grey wall to form a lobby area and had an illuminated sign made up and embedded into the wall which advised gallery visitors to ‘FUCK OFF’ [see Figure 116]. And in Mask of Gold (1997) BANK’s so-called group ‘emotion’ and ‘empathy’ paintings came complete with their own section of wall - a nod to the ‘extended’ frame and a hint that there was more to BANK’s paintings than met the eye [see Figure 117]. (The exhibition design for Mask of Gold seemed to directly reference El Lissitzky’s early forays into exhibition design [see Figure 118]; Lissitzky being an early example of an artist who explored the ‘extended’ frame through experimental exhibition design).

Figure 116: Invitation card for BANK’s exhibition FUCK OFF.

249

Figure 117: BANK, Mask of Gold (1997), exhibition view (works in image by Colin Lowe & Roddy Thompson, Eric Wright, Christy Astuy, Mark Jones, and BANK), Gallerie Poo Poo, London.

Figure 118: El Lissitzky’s design for the International Exhibition of Film and Photography, Stuttgart, 1929.

250 BANK’s harnessing of the ‘extended’ frame successfully created an artist-controlled transitional zone through which the viewer had to pass to get to the actual exhibition (not to mention to get to the individual artworks of the invited artists). This transitional zone (or frame) extended each exhibition beyond the gallery and became an integral and accepted part of the BANK experience. It facilitated, and was wholly consistent with, BANK’s anarchic assault on predictability and convention.

It could be claimed that BANK attacked on three main fronts: they offered a timely and cathartic reaction to the slick packaging techniques prevalent in the commercial gallery sector; they pricked the egos of many artists, curators, critics, collectors, gallerists, and funding bodies; and they heightened awareness and elevated the discussion of the control mechanisms at play when an artist’s work is threaded through a curatorial framework for exhibition.

Although artists have long been concerned about curatorial appropriation and the power of curators (in not only deciding what gets seen, but also how it gets seen), with BANK the question of control was unavoidable, and it was hit home with new force.

It became second nature to us as a group to openly treat each show, in its entirety as a piece of our work. Any artist involved in a BANK show couldn’t be in any doubt as to who was in control; whether by suggesting or cajoling we generally insisted on getting our own way, and never pretended it was any other way. Put bluntly, we weren’t going to allow our ideas for a show to be jeopardised by some other spoilt prima donna of an artist; so we were doing what all curators do, only in a more vulgarly visible way than was usual. By using, too literally, aspects of curation normally kept invisible as part of our shows, we were making tangible what was, and always is, in the background of professional curation - power. To this extent, all BANK shows were, in some way or other, a satire on curation-ego and all its trappings.18

18 Ibid., p. 26. 251 BANK’s approach meant that artworks had to fight for their lives: the artwork’s survival being dependent on its ability to rise above the hullabaloo of the chaotic viewing context to reveal its unique independent logic. BANK’s disregard for the concept that a frame should respond to the requirements of an artwork, and their defiant use of other artists’ work to augment their set-like exhibition designs, meant that artworks often had to simply make do.

We’d decided with Keith Farquar that his work could be hung in the worst space imaginable for paintings - wood panelled walls with peeling yellow paint, an I-beam, a disused winch, an old lathe, all lit with dingy strip lighting. Titles were done on foam board like in white cube galleries, as if the work was pretending that the awful space wasn’t really there at all.19

With the works of invited artists displayed (but also engulfed), revealed (but also concealed through relative overload), the challenge for the viewer was to decipher what the constituent parts of the exhibition were: who was responsible for what? Where did one work start and another end? What formed part of the staging / exhibition design, and what formed part of someone’s work?

Rarely does a visitor to a group exhibition leave without at least some attempt to distinguish between different works, and BANK’s exhibitions were, at least initially, regarded as curated group shows. The viewer was thus in a position of trying to identify the component artworks as well as trying to ‘make sense’ of the overall exhibition experience. It was the disruption of this habitual desire for order and meaning that BANK seemed to most relish.

In her essay, ‘The Global White Cube’, Elena Filipovic claims that artworks are fairly resilient things which have an innate ability to assert their own internal logic, despite perhaps compromised viewing conditions:

19 Ibid., p. 48. 252 Artworks, however much they are elements in the construction of the meaning of an exhibition and, dialectically, also subject to its staging, in fact can also articulate aesthetic and intellectual positions and define modes of experience that resist the thematic or structural frames in which they are

put.20

She adds:

I actually believe in the agency of the artist as author, a singular one at that. This does not preclude the exhibition from providing a context for reading the artwork ... but it does not, to my mind, fundamentally change the artwork nor does it annihilate the dialectic relationship between artwork and

exhibition and the potential sense constructed by their encounter.21

Although I agree with Filopovic that to a particular viewing context does not necessarily change an artwork, and that artworks have the ability to articulate positions and define modes of experience which can resist the rhetoric of their frames, in the case of BANK, artworks were placed under enormous pressure to even get noticed. BANK’s amplified authorial role, as well as their strategic disrespect for the intimate relationship between individual artwork and viewer, thus provided a challenge to the assumption that an artwork will always be able to rise above its context of presentation. BANK’s ‘exhibition/curatorial’ frame not only filtered the reading of individual artworks, it actively hampered them.22

The ability of individual artworks to define their own edge and rise above the ‘noise’ of what surrounds them is also dependent upon the familiarity of the viewer with the practice(s) of the artist(s) involved. Without such knowledge, it is less likely that a separate work will be identified as distinct from its surrounds. Rico Franses likens the lack of internal framing devices in apparently single-episode images to “no-gap-

20 Elena Filipovic, ‘The Global White Cube’ in Barbara Vanderlinden and Elena Filipovic (eds), The Manifesta Decade: debates on contemporary art exhibitions and biennials in post-wall Europe (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2005), p. 79. 21 Ibid., p. 84. 22 Having personally taken part in BANK’s exhibition VIPER/BANK TV (1996) I am writing with some experience of how BANK’s imposed display aesthetic and staging method can affect an artwork. The installation of my work (coloured photographs suspended from the ceiling with fishing wire) was in a constant state of flux (and entanglement) courtesy of the members of BANK. 253 writing”. He points out that legibility is dependent upon one’s familiarity with and recognition of lexical items.

The issue of comprehensibility is the same for the image as it is for ... writing. Continuous writing requires great familiarity with the language to be comprehensible. In fact it depends for its legibility on recognition of specific lexical items. And as long as the words used are familiar and relatively simple, there is little problem in reading such texts... Frames are not the condition of intelligibility when the lexicon is a familiar one; one can dispense with them if viewing audiences are thoroughly acquainted with all items present.23

Despite my familiarity with the practices of many of the artists involved in BANK’s exhibitions, it is BANK’s cathartic curatorial attitude and their absurd exhibition designs that resonate in the memory more than any individual artwork. This shift of focus from artwork to (‘extended’) frame is also clearly visible in the practice of Goshka Macuga. Like BANK, Macuga’s work is a catalyst for debates on the boundaries of authorship, strategies of display, and the relationship between artist and curator. With Macuga’s installations, however, the result is less anarchic: although Macuga’s ‘exhibition/curatorial’ frames overtly compete for attention with what they contain, they still provide a slightly less hostile environment for installed artworks than those provided by BANK.

Macuga’s work encompasses sculpture and installation and explores boundaries that define exhibition structures. Her practice seeks to put the categories of curator and gallery into a new relationship with each other by providing sculptural environments for the exhibition of other people’s work. Macuga’s practice ... examines the importance of and the problematic issues inherent in authorship and explores the role of the gallery within both the curatorial and art-making process.24

23 Rico Franses, ‘Postmonumentality: Frame, Grid, Space, Quilt’ in Paul Duro (ed), The Rhetoric of the Frame: Essays on the Boundaries of the Artwork (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 263 and 266. 24 Gasworks Gallery, Goshka Macuga - Picture Room (London: Gasworks Gallery, press-release, 7 February - 23 March 2003). 254 Whenever one person takes the responsibility for the display of another person’s work, the question of authorship will inevitably arise. This is because, as Emma Barker points out:

... display is a verb as well as a noun, active as well as passive: the point being that display is always produced by curators, designers, etc. As such, it is necessarily informed by definite aims and assumptions and evokes some larger meaning or deeper reality beyond the individual works in the display. In short, it is a form of representation as well as a mode of presentation.25

Consistent with this, any act of (re)framing can also be seen as an authorial act, and Macuga’s art practice can essentially be described as a process of (re)framing: not only has she created a number of specially designed exhibition structures for displaying artworks by other artists, she has also made artworks which tap into a different seam of the ‘extended’ frame, including the artist’s monograph:

Macuga’s show at Kate MacGarry was less ambitious in scope [than previous projects], but several of her long-standing concerns about the nature of framing, selection and collecting were again in evidence... the most prominent piece was a large assemblage (Library Table, 2005), comprising a table, two customized lamps and five books. The table-top had been specially arranged, with each of the volumes being an existing publication about a single, highly prominent 20th-century artist (Marcel Duchamp, Francis Picabia, Martin Kippenberger, Andy Warhol and Sigmar Polke)... What distinguished these monographs from other mass-produced copies of the same books were luscious, custom-made bindings, composed of vellum, canvas, leather or goatskin. Each volume was decorated with an image from the relevant artist’s oeuvre... An artist’s monograph is a kind of frame, a selective representation of the protagonist’s life and work. In rebinding these books Macuga suggests a radical reconfiguration of the canon, or at least a highly personalized reading of it.26

25 Emma Barker, Contemporary Cultures of Display (Yale University Press in Association with Open University, 1999), p. 13. 26 Peter Suchin, ‘Goshka Macuga’ in Frieze (Issue 92, June/July/August 2005), p. 168. 255 Being defined as an artist, rather than a curator, accentuates Macuga’s authorial role: a curator is more likely to step back and allow the authorial ‘voices’ of exhibited artists to be heard, but as an artist, Macuga is in a sense emancipated and free to prioritise her own contribution and role as author above and beyond all others:

While she displays a clear fondness for the material she works with, there is something dispassionate in the way that she may treat a painting by a close friend and an anonymous painting found in a charity shop, for example, with equal attention. She talks about the point at which interest in other people and other people’s work, however passionate and sincere, will always invariably collapse and return to oneself. ‘Ultimately, this is my gig,’ she says to me, ‘just as writing this piece is yours.’27

The incorporated works cannot simply be read therefore as a collection of ‘centred’ works, because each has been incorporated by Macuga into her work, which to an extent decentres them. (Macuga’s installations clearly provide a more synthetic experience than conventional group exhibitions). In the essay ‘Deceptual Art: Contemporary Art as Coproduction’, Laurent Goumarre describes a ‘decentered’ artwork as “a work that resides not in what is presented… but in the necessarily deceptual use of the situation”. The ‘decentered’ work therefore “proposes a displacement of knowing which cannot be verified within the [presented] work”.28 To approach Macuga’s work solely as a collection of ‘centred’ artworks, objects and curiosities is thus to oversimplify what Macuga has created, because within each displayed object is a kind of ‘deception’ or ‘deflection’ which stunts the individual contemplation of that work, and which resists the conventions of traditional museum and gallery display. It is therefore the mode and circumstance of presentation (the exhibition structure and the context of Macuga’s production) rather than the presented (the miscellaneous contributions) which form the focus of attention when considering Macuga’s work.

27 Jonathan Griffin, ‘Goshka Macuga - Books, art history and self-portraits; heaven, hell and purgatory’ in Frieze (Issue 100, June/July/August 2006), p. 236. 28 Laurent Goumarre, ‘Deceptual Art: Contemporary Art as Coproduction’ (translated from the French by Charles Penwarden) in Paul Ardenne, Pascal Beausse, and Laurent Goumarre, Contemporary Practices: Art as Experience (Paris: Dis Voir, 1999), pp. 101-102. 256 For Picture Room (2003) [Figures 119 and 120], Macuga recreated the celebrated Picture Room from Sir John Soane’s Museum, London. The original Picture Room was created by architect Sir John Soane (1753 - 1837) who designed his house as a place to live, but also as a place to display his collection of antiquities and works of art. His home has been open to the public as a museum since the early nineteenth century.

At Gasworks Gallery, London, Macuga’s Picture Room housed the works of over thirty contemporary artists. Macuga’s frame within a frame thus set up a dialogue between the historical museum (Sir John Soane’s Museum) and the contemporary ‘white cube’ (Gasworks Gallery).

Figure 119: Goshka Macuga, Picture Room (2003), installation view, Gasworks, London.

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Figure 120: Goshka Macuga, Picture Room (2003), installation view, Gasworks, London.

In an earlier work, Cave (1999), Macuga created a brown paper walk-in cave in which she displayed artworks borrowed from her artist friends. Again, as with Picture Room, this architectural structure formed an immersive physical frame which heavily influenced the experience of the artworks it contained.

As discussed earlier in this thesis, framing ordinarily attempts to function on two levels: firstly to elevate an artwork for audience interaction and/or contemplation, and secondly to bind an artwork to appropriate contexts for it to have meaning and thus relevance beyond that gleaned from a ‘naked’ artwork-viewer encounter. Macuga’s ‘extended’ frames are of interest here because they strategically leave artworks contextually adrift, or at least ruptured from any prior attempts to frame them by the artist, museum, or collector contributing the work. This in itself is effective in (re)directing attention away from the contained and back onto the container: Macuga’s meta-work. This rupture also creates a more synthetic exhibition environment, where individual works meld into the space of the exhibition, creating the feel of a total artwork or Gesamtkunstwerk,29 rather

29 Gesamtkunstwerk is a German term which translates as ‘total work of art’ or ‘complete artwork’. It is attributed to the German composer Richard Wagner who initially intended it to refer to operatic performances which successfully synthesised multiple artforms. It is often used today in a less specific fashion, particularly in the visual arts, to describe the integration of a number of artforms or parts to create a considered and unified whole. 258 than a ‘parergon’ which surrounds artworks: more akin to ‘installation art’ than to ‘an installation of art’.

The tension between the differentiation of artworks displayed in groups, and the synthesis of those artworks into the exhibition setting, has been a point of interest at least since El Lissitzky’s demonstrationsraums in the 1920s. In fact, Macuga directly referenced Lissitzky’s Kabinett der Abstrakten (1927/8) [Figure 122] with her own version also titled Kabinett der Abstrakten (Cabinet of Abstracts) in 2003 [Figure 123]. Despite sharing the same title, however, Lissitzky’s Kabinett was a walk-in interactive exhibition room specifically designed to house ‘new’ art, whereas Macuga’s Kabinett was a two metre wooden cuboid which concealed and revealed various found objects and items of interest, including a dog’s space suit.30

Figure 121: View of El Lissitzky’s Kabinett der Abstrakten, Provinzialmuseum Hannover, 1928.

30 Macuga’s Kabinett der Abstrakten (Cabinet of Abstracts) (2003) was exhibited at Bloomberg Space, London, in 2003. 259

Figure 122: Goshka Macuga, Kabinett der Abstrakten (2003), mixed media, 2000 x 2000 x 2000 mm.

In a more recent work, as part of the 2006 Liverpool Biennial, Macuga created Sleep of Ulro (2006) [see Figures 123 - 126]. This was a vast all encompassing installation in a former industrial building, and was based on the Renaissance conception of heaven, hell and purgatory. The installation was also influenced by the set designs featured in the film The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari:

Directed in 1919 by Robert Wiene, the film is well known for the brilliance of its set design and set designer Hermann Warm enlisted Walter Reimann and Walter Roehrig, fellow members of Berlin’s Der Sturm group, to act as art directors. They created the unprecedented look of the sets, costumes and makeup to reflect the mind of a madman and succeeded in embodying the aesthetic of the Expressionist movement.31

31 http://www.afoundation.org.uk/greenlandstreet/details.php?id=10 (online press-release) [20 May 2007]. 260 Sleep of Ulro formed a complex exhibition structure in which a number of existing collections, artefacts, botanical specimens, contemporary artworks, objects and curiosities could be displayed. On a more metaphorical level, Sleep of Ulro ‘displayed’ a disregard for the boundaries between artist and curator, art and architecture, artwork and exhibition design, and work and frame. In this regard, Macuga’s exploration for a hybridised and collaborative artform tenaciously probes for new possibilities in, and unpredictable alternatives to, ways in which contemporary art can be produced, presented and experienced. In doing so, the traditional function of display (and the role of the artist) is knowingly unanchored.

Figure 123: Goshka Macuga, Sleep of Ulro (2006), installation view, The Furnace, Greenland Street, Liverpool.

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Figures 124, 125 and 126: Goshka Macuga, Sleep of Ulro (2006), installation view, The Furnace, Greenland Street, Liverpool.

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Conclusion.

The Need to Continually Reassess the Frame. In discussions about contemporary art, we are accustomed to hearing about how art has moved out beyond the frame into real space and time; we are familiar with theories relating to the destabilisation of the artwork’s definitive edge; and we are well versed in how distinctions between art and life have been eroded. As viewers of art (and more recently as ‘participants’ in art) we have experienced this convergence within an evolving landscape of immersive art installations, site-specific artworks, and collaborative art events. In this thesis, I have argued that just as artforms have mutated over time, transgressing traditional media and entering into an expanded field of new possibilities, so too has the frame. It is essential, therefore, to continually reassess the frame as art evolves.

Throughout art history, physical frames have been employed to negotiate physical and conceptual space for artworks. Something that tends to be overlooked when we talk about contemporary art is that this negotiation still takes place and artists continue to employ physical frames in an attempt to carve out appropriate spaces for their work. The contemporary ‘artist’s’ frame can be either integral to a work of art, or it can function as a kind of back-up system to aid the viewer locate and understand a work. When coupled with the staging activities of art institutions (and the perpetual flow of curated exhibitions), framing processes are ever present and happen on many levels.

At a point in time when expressions such as the ‘frameless’ or ‘unframed’ artwork go virtually unchallenged, it is important to ask: what has taken up the role of the traditional picture frame? How do contemporary artists negotiate and contest appropriate space for their work? And what frames are put in place to mediate and shape our experiences of art?

The Reconfigured Frame. In this thesis, I have presented the contemporary physical frame as the material manifestation of an act (or set of acts) of framing. This has allowed for a hugely expanded concept of what constitutes a physical frame. Where once a frame could be found sitting on a wall, sandwiched between the fictional world of a painting and the

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physical reality of the world outside of that painting - directing the viewer’s gaze in much the same way as a window frame - the contemporary physical frame has a far less regimented and static existence. Having been pulled in both macro and micro fashion, the contemporary frame can now, on occasion, be found (as a result of its inward journey) deeply embedded within the actual artwork, and (going outwards) encapsulating both the artwork and the viewer within the same space. The contemporary physical frame is not only in front of us - either osmotically absorbed into the artwork (a la Damien Hirst’s steel and glass vitrines) or separating us from the work in a more traditional manner (as a standard picture frame might) - it is around us too. As visitors to a contemporary art gallery or exhibition, we can stand on the outside of one frame looking in, whilst simultaneously moving around inside another complex set of artist- controlled, collaborative, and/or ‘post-production’ frames. Although the contemporary physical frame can still regularly be found in its original location (on a wall, connected in some way to an artwork, and operating in a relatively conventional way), the contemporary frame can manifest itself in various ways and is far more illusive and multiform than the traditional concept of a material frame.

This thesis has addressed many preconceptions about the frame and its functions. The notion of the frame as cellular, discursive and mobile, breaks the assumption that a frame is solid, rectilinear and static. Rather than an impervious membrane restricting direct access to an artwork, the frame is reconfigured in this thesis as a shifting zone of elements or ‘frame particles’: a threshold through which one must pass in order to reach a work, with each route through the frame being potentially unique. And rather than passively sitting back and waiting for the viewer to approach, the contemporary frame can actively hunt out its audiences via databases, mail-outs and other distributive networks.

Despite its illusive nature, it is still possible to discuss this type of ‘extended’ frame in physical terms. The range of associations triggered by such a frame may be cognitive, and the ideas generating the frame in the first place may be non-physical, but the generated frame is physically present - even if it (the frame) is permeable and the physical elements which constitute it are temporary or in a state of flux. The title of an exhibition, for example, could be said to metaphorically ‘frame’ a group of artworks by implying a certain context or way of reading them, but the title is not relayed to the viewer telepathically. At some stage, the title is written down (on a press-release, an 264

invitation card, a poster etc.) and strategically positioned for the viewer to see. These ‘circumtextual’ features form part of a physical frame, put in place to mediate the viewer’s experience of the exhibited artwork(s). Even the is not excluded from this discussion, because a web presence has to be accessed via a (physical) terminal and experienced as a configuration of on a computer screen. In fact, the internet complements the notion of the contemporary ‘extended’ physical frame as unitary, discursive and transitional.

In light of this expanded view of the physical frame, the assertion that an artwork can be ‘frameless’ seems (at best) incomplete, or (at worst) incorrect. Not only does it show an avoidance or a misunderstanding of the role played by ‘extended’ frames, it also exposes a failure to recognise and reconfigure the frame at the same rate as the development and reconfiguration of new artforms. As I have argued in this thesis, art installations may well have no ‘immediate’ frames, but they are invariably surrounded by a complex set of ‘extended’ frames. The removal of one frame, only exposes an artwork to a sophisticated mesh of other frames, and potentially, a less stable environment. So when we hear about how art has moved out beyond the frame, we are fully justified in questioning exactly which frame has been transgressed.

The Frame as Contested Space. The rambling, amorphous, and evolving nature of the contemporary ‘extended’ frame, as well as possible conflicts of interest between the various parties involved in creating it, compounds the frame’s uncontrollability and leads to a situation where, despite its inexact location and hazy edge, border tensions can still exist. The frame continues therefore to be a contested space.

Although art always presents itself to us ‘prior’ framed, framing never stops. Artworks are eternally open to re-framing from all quarters (art critics, collectors, historians etc.). The physical frame is therefore never complete; it is always being added to. Artists themselves contribute to this perpetually growing frame through a process of commentary and documentation (magazine interviews, monographs, retrospective exhibitions etc.). The tendency by contemporary artists to attempt to control or influence the ‘extended’ frame, both during and after the exhibition of their work, portrays a desire to supplement their work, prolonging artistic consciousness, and thereby deferring the ‘death of the author’. This harnessing of the ‘extended’ frame 265

echoes the function of the late nineteenth-century ‘intracompositional’ frame, and can be interpreted as an attempt by contemporary artists to overcome (curatorial and proprietal) appropriation and (critical) misinterpretation: a desire to reassert a first- person voice in an increasingly collaborative and convoluted domain.

The Necessity of the Frame. Whilst traditionally a frame symbolised that a work was complete, an artwork no longer has to be considered ‘finished’ before it can be framed. As artworks with a ‘relational’ or ‘performative’ aspect demonstrate, artworks can be framed whilst in a transitory state of completion. As art becomes more ‘life-like’ and harder to recognise, being played out in real time and in everyday situations, the framing of art is crucial. Without sufficient framing, there is simply no way of distinguishing a ‘life-like’ artwork from life itself. Without the necessary ‘circumtextual’ material being in place, there is no way that an artist can assert artistic authorship for a work. Frames therefore need to be created in order for a work to register and be interpreted as art, and then maintained - especially with regard to ephemeral artworks - in order for the work to achieve longevity.

The Frame as a Connecting Device. One of the key discoveries of this research was that contemporary artists are now employing frames more as connecting devices rather than as separating devices. This overturns the preconception that the primary aim of a frame is to segregate an artwork off from its surroundings. Although frames have always had a dual purpose to ‘separate’ and ‘bind’, and it is true that frames look ‘out’ (to their surrounds) as well as ‘in’ (to the artwork), the binding function of the contemporary frame is now far more prominent. The separating effect is still present, but it is often subtle: it can be read more as ‘elevation’ than ‘separation’. The frame, therefore, can no longer be seen as a neutral break or ‘dead zone’ around an artwork. The contemporary frame functions by highlighting an artwork enough to get it noticed and to denote artistic authorship, but it also functions by connecting the artwork to relevant contexts (both physical and conceptual) in order for the work to be understood and accrue meaning. In other words, the frame elevates the work and thus deems it significant, it then binds the work to whatever is significant to it. This is where the frame, by mediating the encounter between viewer and artwork, can be used to great effect. In this respect, framing should be thought of as a process of positioning art within life, not sectioning art off from life. And the role of the frame in this should be approached not as one of referee between 266

two opponents, but as one of pacifier and creator of harmonic space within a unitary inter-related whole.

‘Site’ is Not the New Frame. It was important in this thesis to extrapolate some of the differences between the framing of an artwork and its ‘placement’ or ‘siting’; just as it was important to look at the differences between the notion of a frame, a site, and context. Where ‘placement’ implies the placing of a work within a pre-existing site, framing implies the construction of a frame: something specifically created for an artwork (or set of works) which would not exist without the existence of that work. A ‘site’ therefore can be regarded as the place (as in the physical location) or space (such as a theoretical debate) to which an artwork is added or contributes to. A frame, on the other hand, is the thing which is ‘added to’ the work. Put a slightly different way, a ‘site’ pre-exists and will continue to exist irrespective of the siting of an artwork within it or not, whereas a frame is created ‘new’ specifically to negotiate space for an artwork.

Although the site (as with a frame) surrounds an artwork, the art-site relationship is different to the art-frame relationship, because the frame is generated in response to the artwork, not vice-versa. With ‘site-specific’ and ‘context-sensitive’ artworks, the work is either ‘specific’ to the site or ‘sensitive’ to the context of presentation: it is the work which is responsive to the site or context. In contrast, the frame can be seen as ‘work- sensitive’ because it responds to the work. ‘Site’ therefore cannot be regarded as interchangeable with an immersive type of physical frame, because a frame not only implies that it is the result of reactive agency, it also implies a constructed protective and mediating surplus. And it is this constructed ‘surplus’ employed as ‘binding agent’ which particularly characterises the contemporary physical frame.1

Exhibition Design. Consistent with the notion of a frame as something which is ‘responsive’ to works of art and which results in a material ‘surplus’, it is possible to discuss exhibition design as a form of framing. The physical staging or design of an exhibition (being additional to the selected works within an exhibition, and existing in response to and because of those

1 The ‘surplus’ described here can be likened to Germano Celant’s characterisation of the picture frame as a ‘scar’ which accrues to a ‘cut’. See his essay ‘Framed: Innocence or Gilt?’ in Artforum (Vol. 20, March, 1982), pp. 49-55. 267

artworks) can therefore be seen as an ‘extended’ frame: as with other frames within the visual arts, exhibition design negotiates physical and conceptual space for artworks above and beyond that which is negotiated by the works themselves.

The artist-controlled ‘modes of installation’ and exhibition designs discussed in Chapter 4, illustrate how contemporary artists are constructing ‘extended’ frames as mediating zones for the individual works contained within. This artist-controlled interface between viewer and work is clearly visible in Chris Ofili’s The Upper Room (2002, and 2005-7) and Jake and Dinos Chapman’s exhibition Like a Dog Returns to its Vomit (2005). Both show how staging methods have been utilised by contemporary artists to supplement the experience of the installed artworks. In Ofili’s case, the constructed chapel-like room created a feeling of hushed reverence, sympathetic to and extending upon the biblical references in his thirteen paintings. In the case of Jake and Dinos Chapman, the content and aesthetic of each etching was mediated by the idiosyncratic method of installation: the exhibition’s overall composition of a dog defecating and eating its own faeces (or vomiting) set against a nauseous pink painted backdrop created a fittingly brash and disturbing setting for each individually framed etching.

Exhibition design thus has much in common with picture frame design and fabrication: it constructs something new in response to the work; it protects and mediates the work;2 and it is distinguishable from notions of ‘siting’ and ‘placement’ in that it goes beyond the positioning of the work in a pre-existing site. Thomas Eakins’ picture frame for Portrait of Professor Henry A Rowland (1897), discussed in Chapter 1, effectively illustrates this analogy. The function of Eakins’ frame, which is adorned with scientific symbols in order to connect the subject of the painting, Professor Rowland, to his achievements within science, is comparable to how Chris Ofili and the Chapmans’ above-mentioned ‘extended’ frames functioned. Exhibition design and picture framing therefore share a common goal of increasing the effectiveness of ruptured or isolated artworks through the construction of a controlled setting.

John Spiteri embellishes this argument in Chapter 3 when he describes his ‘immediate’ frame as "a fragment of an interior design that is yet to be", and then goes on to describe how his watercolours, by implication, "become part of the theatre of the frame".

2 ‘Protect’ is used here in both a utilitarian sense (to protect an artwork from physical damage) and in a metaphorical sense (to protect a work from misinterpretation by the viewer). 268

Lionel Bawden’s diamond form plinths, also discussed in Chapter 3, which he used in his the spring tune exhibition in 2003/4, further illustrate how exhibition design (this time, artist-controlled plinths) can be used effectively to bind artworks together and implicate them in an outward contextual aesthetic.

The ‘Curatorial’ Frame. At various stages throughout this thesis, I make the comparison between aspects of curating art and the basic principles of framing art. Curating and framing share a common objective, or duty, to protect and display works of art. And both need to be responsive to, respectful of, and directed by the activities of artists.

In a traditional sense, curating (or to curate) is to take care of things: to store and present things in an appropriate and sympathetic manner or context. Curating contemporary art exhibitions (as with framing, and exhibition design) attempts to create appropriate physical and conceptual space for works of art by sufficiently elevating those artworks enough for them to be noticed, but at the same time, binding those artworks to relevant contexts in order for them to engender appropriate responses from those experiencing them.

Exhibition-making invariably involves elements of framing: a process of selection and rejection (a series of decisions regarding what should be included and what should be left out); the construction of an appropriate environment (created specifically in response to, or in anticipation of, an artwork or group of artworks); and then the subsequent promotion/distribution of the project’s rationale and inherent ideas (itself, another form of framing). As curator Hou Hanru has pointed out, curating is not simply about separating artworks off from real life for isolated contemplation, it is about trying to create “an in-between space between two realities”: an attempt to bind art to where and what it is most significant to.3 Responsible curating therefore - as with framing - not only involves processes of selection and rejection, it also involves processes of elevation and connection.

3 Hou Hanru in interview with Paul O’Neill in Paul O’Neill, ‘Hou Hanru’ in Contemporary 21 (Issue 77, 2005), p. 65. 269

When looked at in such a way, the vast majority of curating can be seen to align quite closely with the task of framing. This analogy between curating and framing (‘curator as frame-maker’) can at least be added to other curating analogies prevalent at the moment, such as: the curator as DJ; the curator as stage director; the curator as stylist; the curator as marketing agent; the curator as editor; the curator as producer; and the curator as auteur.4

A Precursor to the White-Walled Gallery Setting. An unexpected by-product of this research was the development of an alternative history for the ‘white cube’. By comparing the history of the ‘immediate’ (picture) frame with the evolution of the white-walled gallery, it became clear that current versions of the history of the ‘white cube’ have overlooked an obvious precursor to the white gallery space. Artists such as Edgar Degas and Camille Pissarro started to use white picture frames during the 1870s, and this is were the battle for ‘white’ as a setting for art was initiated. It was fifty years later that the white-walled gallery started to be accepted as an appropriate backdrop for the display of art. In this respect, the ‘white cube’ can be seen as an immersive ‘extended’ version of the impressionists’ white picture frame.

How the New Framing Model and Categories Function. A key aim of this thesis was to clarify existing framing terminology and create a fuller spectrum of frames in order to facilitate discussion and address some of the ambiguities surrounding the complex relationship between the contemporary artwork and its frame(s). Because the contemporary frame cannot always be considered a ‘parergon’ (separate from the work), the relationship between the frame and the work is often uncertain. What constitutes part of the work (or not) has long been an area of

4 For the curator (and artist) as DJ see Nicolas Bourriaud’s Postproduction (New York: Lukas & Sternberg, 2002) "A DJ’s set is not unlike an exhibition of objects…", p. 38; for the curator as stage director see Jens Hoffmann in Paul O’Niell’s article ‘The Co-dependent Curator’ in Art Monthly (UK) (Issue 291, November, 2005), p. 8, and the Jens Hoffmann interview with Eliza Williams in Contemporary 21 (Issue 77, 2005), p. 71; for the curator as stylist see Alex Coles’ article ‘Curator as Stylist?’ in Contemporary 21 (Issue 77, 2005), pp. 18-21; for curator as marketing agent see Slawomir Marzec in Contemporary 21 (Issue 77, 2005), p. 106; for curator as editor see Teresa Gleadowe in Susan Hiller and Sarah Martin (eds), The Producers: Contemporary Curators in Conversation (4) (Newcastle: BALTIC in collaboration with the University of Newcastle, 2002), p. 107 and p. 130, and Robert Storr in ‘The Exhibitionists’ in Frieze (Issue 94, October 2005), p. 25; for curator as producer see the entire Producers: Contemporary Curators in Conversation series edited by Susan Hiller and Sarah Martin; and for curator as Auteur see Nathalie Heinich and Michael Pollak, ‘From Museum Curator To Exhibition Auteur’ in Reesa Greenberg, Bruce W. Ferguson, and Sandy Nairne (eds), Thinking About Exhibitions (London: Routledge, 1996), pp. 231-250. 270

speculation and contention. This ambiguity has been highlighted by Jacques Derrida in his questioning of where a ‘parergon’ begins and ends,5 as well as by Martha Buskirk in her questioning of what constitutes the work and what constitutes the document or record of the work.6

The ‘collaborative’ and ‘post-production’ frame categories are necessary additions to the ‘artist’s’ frame and form a more complete spectrum of a frame’s context of production: if an artist can be credited with complete authorial control over an ‘artist’s’ frame, it stands to reason that a frame exists that is beyond the artist’s authorial control (a ‘post-production’ frame), as well as partially under the artist’s control (a ‘collaborative’ frame).

The collaborative dynamic between contemporary artists, curators, exhibition designers and architects, has contributed to the erosion of the artwork’s definitive edge and, as a result, made it even more difficult to decipher what constitutes an integral part of an artist’s work. Where does the artwork start and end? Where does exhibition design or the curator’s ‘voice’ start to cut in? How much of the artwork’s context of presentation is relevant for a satisfactory understanding of the artwork? And who is controlling the frame? These are all questions we should ask when experiencing a contemporary artwork, and the answers cannot always be addressed using binary or traditional models.

Although I have used Pearson’s notion of an ‘intracompositional’ and ‘extracompositional’ frame as a starting point in this thesis, I have presented and tested a more complex spectrum of frames which elaborates upon my initial hypothesis that frames can be discussed (and further categorised) according to their level of involvement or relationship to an artwork. As became abundantly clear as my research progressed, all frames are not created equal. The ‘immediate’ frame in contemporary art is not just ‘relevant’ or ‘not relevant’, but is in fact relevant in different ways. By introducing the categories of ‘absolute’, ‘intrinsic’, ‘supplementary’, and ‘disengaged’ frames, this complexity is more adequately represented now than through the description of a frame as ‘intracompositional’ or ‘extracompositional’.

5 See ‘Parergon’ in Jacques Derrida (translated by Geoff Bennington & Ian McLeod), The Truth in Painting (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), pp. 15-147. 6 See Martha Buskirk, The Contingent Object of Contemporary Art (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2003). 271

The need to calibrate the varying degrees of ‘intracompositionality’ was evident in Chapter 3 when analysing Helen Chadwick’s coloured tondo frames for her Wreaths to Pleasure series (1992-93). These frames certainly seem to warrant being termed ‘intracompositional’, but the extent to which the frame is formally and conceptually inseparable from the work is questionable, especially when considering how easily and readily the frame was cropped from photographic reproductions of the work in both the Serpentine gallery brochure and the accompanying exhibition catalogue. Similarly, Lionel Bawden’s distinctive Hammerlok plinths for his monsters… series (2004) appear to be resolutely integral to the work, but this is thrown into doubt when the sculptures appear on his gallery’s website minus their plinths. Although Chadwick’s tondo frames and Bawden’s Hammerlok plinths draw attention to themselves as well as to what they present, they are clearly not always viewed as ‘intrinsic’ to the work. They therefore occupy a previously unarticulated interface between ‘intracompositional’ and ‘extracompositional’.

***

This thesis has looked at how acts of framing physically manifest themselves in material frames, and at how a selection of contemporary artists have employed these physical frames to negotiate physical and conceptual spaces for their artworks. It has attempted to clarify existing framing terminology, and endeavored to introduce various new framing categories to facilitate discussion of the frame. In doing so, this thesis has tested and proved the following two hypothesis: firstly, that as artforms and art events evolve, the frame adapts accordingly; and secondly, that frames can be discussed and categorised according to their level of involvement and relationship to their associated artworks.

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Newhouse, Victoria. Art and the Power of Placement. New York: Monacelli Press, 2005.

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Paton, Justin. Lionel Bawden: the spring tune. Dunedin (NZ): Dunedin Public Art Gallery (exhibition brochure), 6 December 2003 - 29 February 2004.

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Redgate, Jacky (with essay by Michael Desmond). Jacky Redgate 1980-2003. Parkside: Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia, 2005.

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Ryman, Robert. Ryman on his Paintings. London: Tate Gallery (exhibition brochure), 17 February - 25 April 1993.

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Storer, Russell. Jacky Redgate; Life of the System 1980 - 2005. Sydney: MCA (exhibition brochure), 28 November 2005 - 5 March 2006.

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Wilson, Simon. Robert Ryman. London: Tate Gallery (exhibition brochure), 17 February - 25 April 1993.

Wood, Catherine. ‘Steven Gontarski Interviewed by Catherine Wood’ in Untitled: Spring Edition, 2001, pp. 18-19.

Wooley, Charles Leonard. Ur of the Chaldees. Melbourne: Penguin Press, 1954.

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Press-Releases:

Alison Jacques Gallery. Jack Pierson. London: Alison Jacques Gallery, 20 October - 19 November 2005.

Factual Nonsense. Leila Sadeghee, ERRATA. London: Factual Nonsense, 26 November - 17 December 1993.

Gallerie Poo-Poo. White3 (group show curated by BANK). London: Gallerie Poo-Poo, 30 October - 22 November 1998.

Gasworks Gallery. Goshka Macuga, Picture Room. London: Gasworks Gallery, 7 February - 23 March 2003.

Grey Matter Contemporary Art. The Palace of Exaggeration & Everything (group exhibition curated by Ian Geraghty). Sydney: Grey Matter Contemporary Art, 4 - 26 November 2000.

Grey Matter Contemporary Art. The seat with the clearest view (group exhibition curated by Polly Staple). Sydney: Grey Matter Contemporary Art, 13 January - 4 February 2001.

Modern Art. Barry McGee, Easy Tonto. London: Modern Art, 9 September - 30 October 2005.

Rodin Museum. Sculpture in Space, Rodin, Brancusi, Giacometti. Paris: Rodin Museum, 17 November 2005 - 26 February 2006.

The Approach. Dave Muller, Thirty-Three* Revolutions (*And One Third). London: The Approach, 16 October - 13 November 2005.

White Cube. Jake and Dinos Chapman, Like a dog returns to its vomit. London: White Cube, 19 October - 3 December 2005.

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Lists of Works:

Gallery 4A / Half Dozen. Ghosts of the Coast (group exhibition curated by Dougal Phillips). Sydney: Gallery 4A / Half Dozen, 27 April - 24 May 2006.

Gallery Barry Keldoulis. Sean Cordeiro and Claire Healy, Custom Living. Sydney: Gallery Barry Keldoulis, 1 - 24 June 2006.

Grey Matter Contemporary Art. Not Quiet Right (group exhibition curated by Ian Geraghty). Sydney: Grey Matter Contemporary Art, 15 - 30 July 2000.

MCA. Jacky Redgate, Life of the System 1980 - 2005. Sydney: MCA, 28 November 2005 - 5 March 2006.

Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery. Hany Armanious, Art Nouveau Barbeque. Sydney: Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, 10 July - 9 August 2003.

Sherman Galleries. Michael Lindeman, missing in action. Sydney: Sherman Galleries, 11 March - 2 April 2004.

Sherman Galleries. Shaun Gladwell, MMVBREAKLESS SESSIONS. Sydney: Sherman Galleries, 30 June - 23 July 2005.

White Cube. Tracey Emin, My Major Retrospective 1963 - 1993. London: White Cube, 19 November 1993 - 9 January 1994.

Auction Catalogues:

Bonhams & Brooks. Fine English and European Carved and Composition Frames. London: Bonhams & Brooks. Sale Number 28,704, 11am, 12 July 2001.

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Commercial Fine Art Catalogues:

Counter Editions. Counter Editions 2001 Catalogue. London: Counter Editions, 2001. [Catalogue is also available online: http://www.countereditions.com 16 June 2007].

Conferences and Symposiums:

Mounting and Housing Art on Paper for Storage and Display, British Museum, 19 - 20 May 2005.

‘Spaces for Containing Art’ panel discussion at Sites of Communication 2, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 18 March 2005.

Video Recordings:

Chris Ofili. Chris Ofili. UK: Illuminations, 2004.

Websites: http://www.afoundation.org.uk/greenlandstreet/details.php?id=10 [20 May 2007]. http://www.artsjournal.com/artopia/2004/06/brancusis_place.html [19 May 2007]. http://www.asaframers.com.au/info/index.html [20 May 2007]. http://www.axisweb.org/dlFULL.aspx?ESSAYID=24 [20 September 2006]. http://www.countereditions.com [4 May 2005 and 16 June 2007]. http://www.contempart.org.uk/economist/econ_arch24.htm [23 May 2007].

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http://www.darbyshire.uk.com/pages/page.aspx?pageId=20 [30 April 2007]. http://www.darbyshire.uk.com/pages/page.aspx?pageId=50 [30 April 2007]. http://www.janwinkelmann.com/05_MB.html [15 October 2006]. http://www.janwinkelmann.com/06_MB.html [15 October 2006]. http://www.kalimangallery.com/web_pages/Frame_total.htm [10 May 2007]. http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/mcgee/card1.html [20 September 2006]. http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/turnerprize/2005/jimlambie.htm [23 May 2007]. http://www.thebrooklynrail.org/arts/april04/brannon.html [15 October 2006]. http://www.themoderninstitute.com [23 May 2007].

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List of Images.

Figure 1: Gentile da Fabriano, Adoration of the Magi (1423), tempera on wood, 3000 x 2820 mm.

Figure 2: Jeff Wall, A View From An Apartment (2004-05), transparency and lightbox, 1670 x 2440 mm.

Figure 3: Damien Hirst, A Thousand Years (1990), glass, steel, MDF, cow’s head, flies, maggots, insect-o-cutor, sugar, water, 2130 x 4270 x 2130 mm.

Figure 4: The Salon de L’Abondance in the palace of Versailles, France.

Figure 5: Petworth House in Sussex, England, with carved frames and surrounds by Grinling Gibbons.

Figure 6: Thomas Eakins, Portrait of Professor A Rowland (1897), oil on canvas, artist’s frame, 2030 x 1372 mm.

Figure 7: Hans Memling, Christ Blessing (circa 1485-1490), oil on panel, 348 x 262 mm.

Figure 8: Spanish bolection frame with gilt foliate corners and centres, contemporary for: Diego Velazquez, Portrait of Don Pedro de Barberana (1631-3), oil on canvas, 1981 x 1114 mm.

Figure 9: English convex-panel frame with raised flower-foliage corners, centres, and demi-centres, original for: Sir Godfrey Kneller, Dorothy Mason, Lady Brownlow (circa 1664 - 1700), oil on canvas, 2390 x 1420 mm.

Figure 10: Rococo trophy frame original for: Jean-Baptiste Van Loo, Portrait of Louis XV (late 1720s), oil on canvas, 2320 x 1730 mm.

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Figure 11: Swedish Baroque trophy frame circa 1700-10 carved to a design attributed to Nicodemus Tessin the Younger, for: David Klocker Ehrenstrahl, King Charles XI of Sweden (circa 1680), oil on canvas, 820 x 660 mm.

Figure 12: Georges Seurat, Le Crotoy, Upstream (1889), oil on canvas, 700 x 860 mm.

Figure 13: Jan Toorop, The Song of the Times (1893), pencil and crayon on board, 320 x 585 mm.

Figure 14: Robert Delaunay, Simultaneous Windows on the City (1912), oil on canvas and wood (painted frame), 460 x 400 mm.

Figure 15: Edgar Degas, Au Cafe des Ambassadeurs (1885), pastel over etching on buff paper, 265 x 295 mm.

Figure 16: Donald Judd, Untitled, 100 works in mill aluminum (1982-1986), installation view, Chinati Foundation, Marfa, Texas.

Figure 17: Michael Lindeman, New York Ghost #s 11 and 12 (2004), acrylic on canvas on bricks, 760 x 1020 mm each canvas.

Figure 18: Pablo Picasso, Still Life with Chair Caning (1912), oil and oilcloth on canvas, with rope frame, 270 x 350 mm.

Figure 19: Piet Mondrian’s studio at 26, rue du Depart, Paris, 1926.

Figure 20: Roberto Melli, Composizione (1918/9), oil on canvas, 400 x 600 mm.

Figure 21: Richard Artschwager, Mirror (1964), and Chair/Chair (1965), formica on wood, 1549 x 1092 x 102 mm, and 1070 x 1070 x 4250 mm.

Figure 22: Richard Artschwager, Untitled (1966), formica on wood, 1219 x 828 x 305 mm.

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Figure 23: Dan Flavin, A Primary Structure (1964), fluorescent light, 720 x 1220 x 75 mm (lighting hardware).

Figure 24: A sixteenth/seventeenth-century Wunderkammer (Ferrante Imperato’s museum in Naples, 1599).

Figure 25: Jean Berard, A Day in the Salon (1874), oil on canvas, 1000 x 810 mm.

Figure 26: Kasimir Malevich, The Last Futurist Exhibition of Pictures 0.10 (Zero.Ten) (1915), installation view, St Petersburg.

Figure 27: Allan McCollum, 100 Plaster Surrogates (1982-1990), enamel on cast hydrostone, 2180 x 9500 x 50 mm.

Figure 28: Thomas Demand, Klause (2006), installation view, Esther Schipper, Berlin.

Figure 29: Guggenheim Museum, Bilboa.

Figure 30: Provincial Louis XIV carved and gilded frame as illustrated in Bonhams & Brooks auction catalogue.

Figure 31: Gary Hume, The Cleric (2000), silkscreen print on paper, 940 x 690 mm, frame size: 1020 x 760 mm.

Figure 32: Hany Armanious, Lantana Lovers Under Moon Fire By Hurtle Duffield From Patrick White’s The Vivesector (2004).

Figure 33: Sir Edward Poynter, The Visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon (1890), oil on canvas, 2345 x 3505 mm. Frame designed by the artist.

Figure 34: Marcel Broodthaers, Musée d’Art Moderne - Département des Aigles - Section XVIIe Siecle (1969), installation view, A 37 90 89, Antwerp, Belgium, 27 September - 4 October 1969.

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Figures 35 and 36: Daniel Buren, Within and Beyond the Frame (1973), installation view, John Weber Gallery, New York.

Figures 37, 38 and 39: Germaine Kruip, Point of View (2002), San Miguel de Tucuman, Argentina.

Figure 40: Walter De Maria, The Lightning Field (1977), situated in a remote area of the high desert of New Mexico, it comprises 400 steel poles installed in a grid measuring one mile by one kilometer.

Figure 41: Detail from a series of individually designed, titled, and hand-painted posters by FlatPack001 for the room with the clearest view exhibition at Grey Matter Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2001.

Figure 42: FlatPack001, Drop (2001), rip stop nylon, thread, and ink, 4080 x 1500 mm (eight-paneled parachute), installation dimensions variable.

Figure 43: FlatPack001, Drop (2001) (detail).

Figure 44: Poster designed by Liam Gillick for Matthew Brannon’s Penetration exhibition at Jan Winkelmann, Berlin, 2005.

Figures 45, 46 and 47: Settings & Players (2001), curated by Louise Neri and Vince Aletti, installation view, White Cube, London.

Figures 48 and 49: Julie Verhoeven, Fat-Bottomed Girls (2002), installation view, Mobile Home, London.

Figure 50: Jacky Redgate, photographer unknown. A Portrait Chronicle of Photographs, England 1953-1962 (1980-83), gelatin silver photographs, mat, wooden frame, 76.2 x 50.8 cm [frame]. Installation: Jacky Redgate - Life of the System 1980– 2005, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2005-06. Photo: Jenni Carter

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Figure 51: Jacky Redgate, Big Fish Eat Little Fish (1985) from the series Naar het Schilder-Boeck, gelatin silver photograph, mat with ink stamp, sandblasted glass, 1105 x 1092 mm (frame size).

Figure 52: Jacy Redgate, A Picture is No Substitute for Anything #11 (1996), C-type photograph, mat, glass, custom-made frame in composition board, 486 x 425 mm.

Figure 53: Tracey Emin, Uncle Colin (1963-93), framed memorabilia, installation dimensions variable.

Figure 54: Gavin Turk, Stool (1990), wooden stool, glass, 900 mm (height).

Figure 55: Gavin Turk, Pop (1993), glass, brass, MDF, fibreglass, wax, clothing and gun, 2790 x 1150 x 1150 mm.

Figure 56: Yuji Takeoka, Floating Pedestal (1992), 600 x 850 x 850 mm.

Figure 57: Marcus Harvey, Reader’s Wife 1 (1993-4), oil on canvas, 2130 x 2130 mm.

Figure 58: Georges Seurat, Young Woman Powdering Herself (1988 - 90), oil on canvas, 955 x 795 mm.

Figure 59: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no. 11 (1992-3), cibachrome photograph, powder-coated steel, glass, aluminium faced MDF, 1100 x 1100 x 50 mm.

Figure 60: Serpentine gallery brochure with Wreath to Pleasure no. 11 minus frame.

Figure 61: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no. 1 (1992-3) as represented in the publication Effluevia.

Figure 62: Helen Chadwick, Wreath to Pleasure no. 1 (1992-3), cibachrome photograph, powder-coated steel, glass, aluminium faced MDF, 1100 x 1100 x 50 mm.

Figure 63: Helen Chadwick, Meat Abstract # 4 (1989), colour Polariod, 810 x 710 mm (silk mat and frame not shown in image). 295

Figure 64: Mat Collishaw, Flesheater 4 (2000), silkscreen print on paper (edition of 300), 740 x 870 mm.

Figure 65: Jack Pierson, Self Portrait #25 (2005), digital pigment print on paper, 1360 x 1090 mm (unframed).

Figure 66: Hany Armanious, Untitled hair drawing #5 (2003), human hair and acrylic binder on polyester, frame, 255 x 300 mm (canvas size), 444 x 492 mm (framed).

Figure 67: Hany Armanious, Wall rubbing #13 (2003), clogged sandpaper, frame, 230 x 280 mm (paper size), 340 x 415 mm (framed).

Figure 68: John Spiteri, Instruction (2004), watercolour on paper, frame, 170 x 130 mm (paper size).

Figure 69: Matthys Gerber, Spirale (2005), oil and inkjet on canvas, framed.

Figure 70: Matthys Gerber, Spirale (2005), detail.

Figure 71: Matthys Gerber, Spirale (2005), text on reverse of canvas.

Figure 72: Damien Hirst, My Way (1990-91), old drug bottles, cabinet, 1370 x 1020 x 230 mm.

Figure 73: Marc Quinn, Self (1991), blood, stainless steel, Perspex and refrigeration equipment, 2080 x 630 x 630 mm.

Figure 74: Marc Quinn, Eternal Spring (Lilies) I (1998), stainless steel, glass, frozen silicon, lilies and refrigeration equipment, 2197 x 900 x 900 mm.

Figure 75: Kate Rohde, Emerald cut vitrine with luxury interior (2006), polyester resin, faux fur, enamel paint, papier mâché, rice paper, pastel paper, MDF, Perspex, co- polymer sealant, polyurethane foam, polystyrene, air-dry clay, tape, aluminium wire, sheet aluminium, glitter, 1130 x 910 x 685 mm.

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Figure 76: Damien Hirst, The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991), tiger shark, glass, steel, formaldehyde solution, 2130 x 5180 x 2130 mm.

Figure 77: Sean Cordeiro and Claire Healy, The Plastic Menagerie (2006), inflatable animals in vitrines, 3000 x 2300 x 1950 mm.

Figure 78: Display of Brancusi sculptures in the rotunda lobby, Guggenheim Museum, New York, as part of Rendezvous: Masterpieces from the Centre Georges Pompidou and the Guggenheim Museums; 14 October 1998 - 24 January 1999.

Figure 79: Lionel Bawden’s the spring tune exhibition at Dunedin Public Art Gallery, New Zealand (2003/4).

Figure 80: Richard Deacon, Facts Not Opinions (1991), detail. Laminated and carved wood ‘island’ by Richard Deacon, supporting gilt and lacquer centre table attributed to Louis Le Prince-Ringuet and Marcotte (circa 1855-60), a bronze cast of Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux’ Genie de la Danse (1869), and a silver berry spoon from the Gorham Company (no date).

Figure 81: Image & Idol, installation view. foreground: tomb of Sir Thomas Andrew and his two wives (circa 1555-64).

Figure 82: Image & Idol, installation view. foreground: double effigy of Armoured Knight and Lady (circa 1325-35).

Figure 83: Jim Lambie, Psychedelic Cockatoo (2005), ceramic, enamel paint, spray cans, duct tape, dimensions variable.

Figure 84: Jim Lambie, Night Owl v Day Glo (2005), ceramic, enamel paint, spray cans, duct tape, 1320 mm (height), dimensions variable (length and depth).

Figure 85: Steven Gontarski, Speed I (1999/2000), fibreglass, spray paint, 1956 x 635 x 470 mm.

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Figure 86: Steven Gontarski, Prophet Zero III (2003), fibreglass, oak plinth. Economist Plaza, London.

Figure 87: Steven Gontarski, Prophet Zero III (2003), fibreglass, 2150 x 567 x 577 mm.

Figure 88: Steven Gontarski, Prophet Zero I (2003), 2150 x 567 x 577 mm. Karyn Lovegrove Gallery, Los Angeles.

Figure 89: Lionel Bawden, esque - thoughts brought forth by our fingers (2000-02), 18 forms (coloured pencils, epoxy), installation view. GRANTPIRRIE Gallery, Sydney.

Figure 90: Examples of Bawden’s Monsters series with Hammerlok plinths.

Figure 91: Page from GRANTPIRRIE gallery brochure which presents the monsters (like some colossal python which after swallowing a mountain is sluggishly digesting the meal) (2004) with the plinth cropped from view.

Figure 92: the monsters (sun in my mouth) (2004) presented on polished concrete floor at www.grantpirrie.com/GRANTPIRRIE/Lionel_Bawden_2004/lb03.shtml [23 May 2007].

Figure 93: Gareth Jones, Modular Plinth (2003), stained and lacquered plywood, dowel pegs, 900 x 300 x 300mm.

Figure 94: Shaun Gladwell, Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) (2005), DV/DVD, 17:56 min, edition of 4.

Figure 95: Shaun Gladwell, Study II - Virginia by the Sea (Bondi) (2005), DV on PSP gaming unit, 4:55 min.

Figure 96: Installation view of Hilary Lloyd’s solo exhibition at Chisenhale Gallery, London, 1999.

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Figures 97 and 98: Dave Muller, Thirty-Three* Revolutions (*And One Third) (2005), installation view, The Approach, London.

Figure 99: Gareth Jones, Seven Pages From a Magazine (1975 - 2001), detail, framed magazine pages, installation dimensions variable.

Figures 100 and 101: The entrance to Barry McGee’s exhibition Easy Tonto at Stuart Shave / Modern Art, London, 2005.

Figures 102, 103, 104 and 105: Barry McGee, Easy Tonto (2005), installation view.

Figures 106, 107, 108 and 109: Jake and Dinos Chapman, Like a dog returns to its vomit (2005), exhibition view, White Cube, London.

Figure 110: Chris Ofili, The Upper Room (Tate version, 2005-7), 13 paintings in room designed in collaboration with architect David Adjaye, installation view.

Figure 111: Chris Ofili, Mono Gris (1999-2002), oil, acrylic, glitter, graphite, fibre tip pen, elephant dung, polyester resin and map pins on canvas, 1832 x 1228 mm (support dimensions). Mono Gris was a constituent part of The Upper Room.

Figures 112 and 113: BANK, Zombie Golf (1995), exhibition view, Bankspace, London.

Figure 114: BANK, Cocaine Orgasm (1995), exhibition view (works in image by BANK, Janette Parris, and Rebecca Warren), Bankspace, London.

Figure 115: BANK, Cocaine Orgasm (1995), exhibition view (works in image by Chris Ofili, Michael Stubbs, Tim Allen, Stephen Glynn, BANK, Max Wigram, David Burrows).

Figure 116: Invitation card for BANK’s exhibition FUCK OFF (1996).

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Figure 117: BANK, Mask of Gold (1997), exhibition view (works in image by Colin Lowe & Roddy Thompson, Eric Wright, Christy Astuy, Mark Jones, and BANK), Gallerie Poo Poo, London.

Figure 118: El Lissitzky’s design for the International Exhibition of Film and Photography, Stuttgart, 1929.

Figures 119 and 120: Goshka Macuga, Picture Room (2003), installation view, Gasworks, London.

Figure 121: View of El Lissitzky’s Kabinett der Abstrakten, Provinzialmuseum Hannover, 1928.

Figure 122: Goshka Macuga, Kabinett der Abstrakten (2003), mixed media, 2000 x 2000 x 2000 mm.

Figures 123 and 124: Goshka Macuga, Sleep of Ulro (2006), installation view, The Furnace, Greenland Street, Liverpool.

Figure 125: Goshka Macuga, Sleep of Ulro (2006), installation view (Element 4, external).

Figure 126: Goshka Macuga, Sleep of Ulro (2006), installation view (Element 4, internal).

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Acknowledgments.

There are numerous people who deserve recognition for their contribution to this research. Firstly, I’d like to thank my Supervisor, Alan Krell, for his unwavering enthusiasm and encouragement over the past 3 and a half years, and for his impeccable judgment in deciding when to allow space for my thesis to develop and when to reign my ideas back in. Without Alan’s input (readings of drafts, suggestions, re-readings, feedback sessions, emails and sporadic phone calls) this thesis would no doubt have read quite differently. I would also like to thank my Co-Supervisor, Toni Ross, for her prompt and invaluable responses to my queries during my candidature. Anna Munster also deserves recognition for her initial research advice and for recommending Alan as a suitable Supervisor. Thanks also to Richard Grayson, Monica Ross, and the late Shelagh Cluett for supporting my research when it was at the proposal stage. To the artists who gave up their time to answer my interview questions (Michael Lindeman, Jacky Redgate, Hany Armanious, John Spiteri, Lionel Bawden, Sean Cordeiro, Claire Healy, and Shaun Gladwell), and to the artists who contributed to this thesis through discussions (including Goshka Macuga, Gareth Jones, Simon Barney, Mark Titchner, TV Moore, Mimi Tong, Uriel Orlow, Christopher Dean, and Simon Moretti) I wish to say a massive thank you. From the framing industry, I would especially like to mention June Andersen (The Framing School) and Jochen Letsch (ASA Conservation Framing) for their energy, contribution and receptiveness to research and new ideas in framing. Thank you also to John Pandolfini (Fini Frames), Laura Beveridge and Mark Darbyshire (Darbyshire Framemakers), and Charles Hewitt (Charles Hewitt Frames). I would also like to thank friends and family who have continually enquired about my progress (including my mother-in-law who regularly and charmingly asks me “How’s TAFE going?”). Finally, and most importantly, a huge and uncompromised thank you to my wife Linda and son Harvey who have encouraged me all the way, and who remind me and inspire me that there is life beyond a PhD.

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