Framing Record Covers Within the Canon of Art
Exploring the use of frames and borders inside the 12" canvas
The concept of the frame dates back to ancient Egyptian and Greek art. They first existed as border-like shapes on pottery and partitions before the three dimensional frames that we all know today came into popularity in the 12th and 13th centuries. Just like how frames have lived within artwork of ancient relics, album covers throughout the years have experimented with borders in their composition.
In 1971, British artist Nick Drake released his second album Bryter Layter. The LP may be one of the most lauded records in indie music, and the cover has had an equally profound influence on the aesthetic of many releases today. Simple at its core, the art centers around a photo of Drake candidly sitting in a darkly lit studio. The photo is framed by an oval shape with a thin orange stroke and a purple background.
Four years prior in 1967, Bob Dylan released John Wesley Harding with a tombstone shaped photo gracing its cover alongside Dolly Parton’s Jolene which sports a delicate ornamental frame. The negative space surrounding the frame guides the listener’s eyes to the central focal point.
With the three dimensional frame’s ubiquitous pairing with art in current times, a frame within a piece of artwork may seem ironic, or redundant, but in fact it’s harkening back to its start in ancient Greek and Egyptian art. It’s a type of easter egg that has been included in paintings for centuries since, see Johannes Vermeer and Diego Velázquez’s references to frames in their paintings. Surrealist artists aptly took advantage of turning the frame on its head, like Rene Magritte with L’Évidence éternelle and Salvador Dali with Couple with Their Heads in the Clouds. Even in modern art, creators have included the homage within their pieces, like artists Hassan Hajjaj and Oscar yi Hou.
A frame on an album cover has become an aesthetic marker of music from the turn of the 60s into 70s. Flipping through any record crate in 2023, coming across a modern release with a frame on it suggests there’s a very good chance that the music within that vinyl is influenced by that former time.
One of those artists is Azniv Korkejian, also known as Bedouine. Korkejian has used the aesthetic device of the frame on the majority of her album artworks. The design of her debut album cover reminds me of Bryter Layter. We see the singer in a contrasted anonymous space, once again framed by a pendant-like shape, much like Drake’s.
Other indie artists like The Weather Station, Kurt Vile and Steve Gunn have also used the staple aesthetic to root their albums in the early days of rock and roll. See these and more framed album covers below.
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this is so much more interesting than a conversation about a painting being in a frame making it a sculpture. And so visually pleasing.
great read! have always been fascinated by covers with internal framing, feels odd not to mention MBDTF or Blonde tho? feel like those are the two most well known of the modern era