Italian Granito Frame
This frame for Joice M Hall’s painting came about following a workshop I took with William Adair of Gold Leaf Studios in Bethesda, Maryland. The workshop centered on the Italian frame ornamentation of Granito patterning. After the leaf is laid onto the frame the clay remains moist for a few hours and stone burnishers and metal punches are pressed into the gold leaving indentations. Once finished, certain areas of the gold are burnished to bring up the shine. We rubbed the panels of the frame aggressively to reveal much of the red clay underneath. The grid work of the ground in the painting was continued onto the panel to create an extension of the perspective employed in the painting. In terms of style, I kept thinking of the Mexican town the painting depicts—San Miguel de Allende—so I tried to keep the frame looking fairly simple and honest in execution: A peasant’s attempt at grandeur, similar to the home made costumes used in the Semana Santa Procession depicted in the painting.