Framing And Mat Standards For Watercolors

Watercolors are a more delicate medium so lighter neutrals tend to work better.

Framing and mat standards for watercolors.

If a large portion of your paper is white mat with a light color and a darker inner mat in a complementary color. If you ve added a four inch mat to a 16 x 20 inch watercolor your new dimensions are 24 x 28 inches. Cheap joe s art stuff offers a variety of matboards mounting board pre cut mats mounts and mat frames for framing and presenting your artwork. Museum quality made with 100 rag should last 25 to 50 years.

Your eye can usually tell if your painting is out of proportion to the frame. Materials and tools needed to frame your watercolor painting frame kit from your local framing store should include frame mat board i use a double mat foam core backing board d rings and self tapping screws nylon hanging string glass front. Matting your watercolors protects and enhances the look of your paintings by cleanly defining the image edges and isolating your image in a uniform neutral or complementary background. Currently there are several types of matting material acid free buffered or what is called regular matboard should last about 7 years before the buffering gradually turns acid.

In general using the dominant colors of the art in the mat draws the eye to the art rather than to the framing. Bottom weighted mats bottom weighting means making the bottom mat width slightly wider than the top left and right sides to compensate for an optical illusion that happens where your bottom mat width looks narrower. Any wider may look overpowering. This allows the mat to overlap the image slightly holding it behind the frame.

Be sure to vary the width of the mat and frame as similar widths can appear visually stagnant. We recommend a mat at least twice as wide as the width of the frame. Screwdrivers you will probably need both a flat and a phillips head type. Always mat your art 3 or wider.

Often the artist has some focal point that contrasts with the background colors. Mats are made from mat board which should be made from all cotton acid free fiber. I almost always double mat my art. Matting and framing your work.

If you mat with those background colors the artist s intended focal point will still draw the eye to it. For these dimensions a one to two inch wide frame would look fine. Generally the mat will cover 1 4 on each side of the image. The mat is the quiet that allows the artwork to sing a standard mat width is 2 1 2 to 3 although larger artwork will require something more substantial.

Generally the top mat will be darker on a. When in doubt keep it simple. The mat opening will be slightly smaller than the suggested picture size. Note that in many watercolor competitions they require a white mat so it is better to double mat in white.