Ian Geraghty The Reconfigured Frame Various Forms and Functions of the Physical Frame in Contemporary Art. A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. College of Fine Arts, 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 framing: 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 / Tracey Emin. 140 . Gavin Turk, Stool (1990) / Yuji Takeoka, Floating Pedestal (1992). 149 . Marcus Harvey. 155 . Helen Chadwick. 159 . Counter Editions. 168 . Jack Pierson. 171 . Hany Armanious / John Spiteri / Matthys Gerber. 173 . Vitrines (Marc Quinn / Kate Rohde / Damien Hirst / 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 negative 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 sculpture, 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