[alt-photo] Re: bottom-weighting mats

[Francesco Fragomeni]

I think the best advise you can deduct from all of our responses is to
trust what your eye tells you. Go look at work at the local museum and
galleries. Look at photography and focus on photography that has similar
qualities as your work and pay attention to it's presentation. Your eye
will tell you what you like. Mimic that and you'll soon come to a personal
preference as to how you want to present your work. There are so many
factors to influence you i.e. tradition, buying pre-cut vs hand cutting, to
matte or not to matte, etc. You'll have to make those decisions yourself.
I'm a bit of a traditionalist in how I feel photogrpahy should be presented
so I'm influenced by that. I cut my own mattes so the time that takes and
the effort is outweighed by my ability to cut what I feel is the perfect
matte for any given print. I don't like unmatted photography so I don't
even think about that. I also am not a follower of today's tendency toward
giant prints so that isn't an issue for me. In the end, what matters is how
I feel the print looks on the wall which is influenced by all of what I
just mentioned. What you decide to do will be based on many observations
and decisions.

-Francesco


On Wed, Nov 30, 2011 at 11:43 AM, Dave S (fotodave)
<fotodave at dsoemarko.us>wrote:

> Originally the practice is used for paintings, and it started in the old
> days where paintings are often hung very high in a houses (above the door
> and near the ceiling... imagine big museums, white house or buildings like
> that). When you look up at a painting like that, the bottom part is closer
> to your eye. Because of that, the brain expect it to be larger than the
> further side, but in reality the perspective distortion is not big enough
> to
> create a significant difference. So if both top and bottom are of the same
> size, the brain actually perceived the bottom to be smaller (because it
> expects bigger but it is the same)! This is opposite to what we think, but
> it is just an optical illusion that occurs.
>
> So to compensate for that, artists would make the bottom a little taller
> than the top.
>
> Today we hang our art works about eye level, so there is no real need for
> bottom compensation, but as always happening in arts, the bottom weight
> became a style in itself, and since people were so used to it, pictures
> look
> a little strange if they are not matted that way. Then of course in arts,
> some people like changes and don't like to follow certain rules, so the
> trend might turn back to same size top and bottom.
>
> In summary, there is no real need now as there was in the past (and I mean
> past century or two centuries ago), so I guess it is a personal preference
> nowadays.
>
>
> Dave
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: alt-photo-process-list-bounces at lists.altphotolist.org
> [mailto:alt-photo-process-list-bounces at lists.altphotolist.org] On Behalf
> Of
> Christina Anderson
> Sent: Wednesday, November 30, 2011 11:08 AM
> To: Alt List
> Subject: [alt-photo] bottom-weighting mats
>
>  How many of you bottom weight your mats and if so by how much? I have
> been
> told that contemporary work has abandoned that practice, but uses mats of
> equal size all the way around. Short of bringing a tape measure with me to
> galleries, input on both sides of this issue much appreciated.
> Christina Z. Anderson
> christinaZanderson.com
>
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