[alt-photo] Re: bottom-weighting mats

[Tomas Sobota]

Laura, what you say about protection is true, but then surely a mat only
slightly larger than the print would do?
Not to speak of another, only somewhat related, matter: do you have to
cover the print with glass in all cases? Some alt prints are far better
displayed without glass, same as oil paintings and all techniques where
medium texture is important.

Tom

On Thu, Dec 1, 2011 at 10:17 AM, Laura V <laura at lavatop.com> wrote:

> Tom, the reason prints are matted is for protection: 1. to protect the
> print from condensation by moving it away from the glass and 2. encase the
> print in an acid free environment (you should also use acid free matting
> behind the print.
>
> I used to work at a framing shop and the rule of thumb we used was 1/4 to
> 1/2 inch more weight at the bottom for a 3-4 inch wide mat (depending on
> the size of the print, the width of the mat and whether it was vertical or
> landscape). This is so the the mat would LOOK EQUAL, not to make it look
> bigger at the bottom. Of course we sometimes put a square print in a
> heavily bottom weighted mat for effect, but this is purely an aesthetic
> decision.
>
> Laura
>
>
> On 11/30/11 17:49 PM, Tomas Sobota wrote:
>
>> I used to bottom-weight vertical images and center horizontal images. For
>> no reason except because I saw photographs displayed that way. However
>> then
>> I noticed that paintings 1. are not matted and 2. usually reach to the
>> inner border of the frame. So, I wondered why photographs have to be
>> matted
>> at all. I can understand it in the case of the small print formats that
>> were in vogue some decades ago, because matting gave them more physical
>> presence. But today everybody tends to print large, so why mat at all? I
>> sometimes mat and sometimes use other forms of presentation. When I mat I
>> leave equal width borders all around.
>>
>
>
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