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Apollo - The International Arts Magazine
Interviews

Transforming the National Gallery, one painting at a time

Isabella Smith
14 May 2024
[LEAD-Arnolfini-before-and-after]

The Arnolfini Portrait (1434) by Jan van Eyck, before and after its
recent reframing. Photos: courtesy The National Gallery, London

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'Often the most appropriate frame is the most invisible frame,' says
Peter Schade, head of framing at the National Gallery in London. The
sentiment points to a paradox: the more Schade excels at his work,
the less people will notice it. It's only when tastes run counter to
his own that we are reminded that how paintings are framed is always
a choice, not an inevitability.

To get to our interview, I'm escorted through a discreet door in a
gallery cafe into corridors rather like a hospital's and then into a
windowless workshop. Here, with the rumble of tube trains passing
underneath, Schade creates, repairs and fits the frames that will
protect masterpieces while also colouring our perceptions, whether we
notice their effect or not.

The work may be quiet, but that doesn't mean it doesn't attract
attention. Schade regularly posts his efforts on social media and the
reframing of one of the gallery's most famous paintings created more
online discussion than usual. The before and after snaps of Van
Eyck's The Arnolfini Portrait (1434) show its new, unornamented
15th-century frame and the 19th century neo-Gothic frame of dark wood
it replaced. One response on X (formerly Twitter) claimed that
'Basically, the new frame forces our ideas of minimalism on the
painting, even though it is an [sic] 15th century gilded moulding.'

[Peter-Schade-2]

Peter Schade, the head of framing at the National Gallery, carving a
frame from poplar wood. Photo: Joshua Page

What Schade is up against here is the friction between familiar ideas
of the past versus historic evidence. The Victorian frame was
'completely incongruous - like a fantasy Swiss chalet around the
painting'. The contemporaneous frame was chosen in part due to its
similarity to the frame housing Van Eyck's Portrait of a Man (Self
Portrait?) (1433), also in the collection, and to the way it brings
that cool Northern European light alive. 'The painted details are so
sharp and fine, but then you had this odd, not very skilful carving
competing for your attention.'

'There's a lot of... semi-knowledge about this subject,' Schade says in
a mild tone. 'We didn't reframe The Arnolfini Portrait in any way
flippantly. Before, you couldn't see the painting without also seeing
the frame - whereas I think now the frame allows you to see the
painting first.' Schade is effusive about Van Eyck's frames: 'He
quite often painted the frame himself - there's a lot of marbled or
stone-style frames, and frames with inscriptions. He plays all kinds
of intriguing games with visual effects.' (The website
closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be is, he tells me, 'a great place to zoom in
on the splashes'.)

[Framing-studio-image-2]

Work in progress at the framing studio. Photo: The National Gallery,
London

Thanks to the closure of the museum's Sainsbury Wing due to building
work - its reopening is too late for the gallery's 200th anniversary
this month - Schade and his small team currently have access to works
that are otherwise seldom off view. When I visit, the workshop floor
is filled by a half-finished frame almost three metres long, designed
to replace the 1950s reproduction antique that previously encased The
Martyrdom of Saint Sebastian (1475) by Antonio and Piero del
Pollaiuolo. However impressive the intricate carving of this
half-finished piece, I can't help but notice the tool rack beside it.
It is a thing of beauty: a gilt diptych frame filled with neat rows
of chisels. Schade uses the same materials and techniques used by
framers of yore, rabbit-skin glue and all. The only exception: modern
nails, which are apparently 'much better'.

At 16, Schade - who is German - completed an apprenticeship as a
woodcarver, before working at an antiques restoration company in
Berlin. He moved to London in the early 1990s and found work with the
framers Arnold Wiggins & Sons; after three years, he set up his own
framing workshop. In 2005, the National Gallery invited him to apply
for the role of head of framing. He still works for himself two days
a week, both for the additional income and to avoid 'becoming
institutionalised. I think it's kept me going - it gives me a bigger
scope.'

[Framing-Studio-image-1]

Work in progress at the framing workshop in the National Gallery.
Photo: The National Gallery, London

In his 19 years at the NG, Schade has reframed almost 400 paintings:
an average of around 20 a year. More than 250 have been placed in
newly acquired antique frames, thanks to two or three 'very loyal'
supporters who donate for the purpose every year. 'There wasn't any
budget for that kind of thing when I first arrived, but now we have
external funding it has been much, much easier,' he says. He buys
frames opportunistically: 'When something comes up at an auction or a
smaller dealer, I can react quickly rather than have some long
process of finding funding. And that's why we've been able to do so
much with a relatively modest amount of money.'

For Schade, finding frames of the highest quality often comes first.
Once a frame has been acquired, he then considers which painting it
would best suit, before presenting his proposal to the relevant
curator. Other times, the process begins when conservation treatment
offers an opportunity to reassess a frame - as with Uccello's The
Battle of San Romano (c. 1438-40), for which Schade is making a new
frame of inlaid walnut that better reflects historic evidence of how
it was first displayed. 'Originally these Uccello paintings were not
framed - just set into niches. This new frame looks kind of like wall
panelling from a Renaissance room.'

    We changed the frame on Picasso's 1914 Still Life yesterday. We
    replaced the 1970s dealer frame with an austere 17th century
    black plate frame; it looks much more modern and daring, draws
    out the subtle shades of grey and black and makes the composition
    more three dimensional. pic.twitter.com/Qe8561jLGp

    -- Peter Schade (@psframes) December 13, 2023

Which reframing has made the biggest difference, I ask? He demurs
over a definitive answer but does point to Picasso's Still Life 
(1914), which is now in an austere 17th-century black plate frame.
Previously, it had a decorative Spanish-style black and gold frame
that 'completely fought with the composition,' he says. 'But in its
new frame, the work suddenly looks three-dimensional, with the centre
seeming to rise up. Suddenly it has a volume to it.' Though this
'new' frame is three centuries older than the work, Still Life now
appears far more modern than it did.

Another success - 'possibly my favourite', says Schade - was the
reframing of Meindert Hobbema's The Avenue at Middelharnis (1689). It
was previously displayed in an 18th-century gilt frame punctuated by
ornate decoration, originally designed for a portrait. 'For
landscapes, such frames don't really work because there is no real
emphasis in the composition at these points, which pulls up the
horizon's edges,' he says, gesturing to the decorative elements. The
painting is now in a narrow black frame that 'lets the horizon stay
down. The road seems to spill out into the room, whereas the previous
frame made a kind of barrier.'

[Hobbema-before-and-after]

The Avenue at Middelharnis (1689) by Meindert Hobbema, before and
after reframing. Photos: courtesy The National Gallery, London

This work is a delicate balance of art and craft: the skill to create
a perfect imitation of a carved baroque cherub, for example, and the
aesthetic sensitivity to anticipate what effect it will have on an
artwork. There is scholarship, too, of course. The design for the new
frame for the Pollaiuolos' Saint Sebastian is drawn from Schade's
familiarity with original Pollaiuolo frames: pilasters from a work in
San Gimignano, inner frame from one in the Uffizi, and predella and
architrave from a Florentine frame of the period.

We should appreciate such skilled work while we can. Schade belongs
to a generation that cut its teeth when London was the international
centre for the trade in Old Master paintings. As collecting tastes
change and supply dwindles, so has the market previously catered to
by large framing workshops. Sole traders are often unable to take on
apprentices or train inexperienced assistants. 'It weighs on my mind
that though my generation will probably be around for another 15-20
years, I can then see it all coming to an end. That's a shame.'

There is a gravity to this quiet, unglamorous work that often passes
unremarked. 'Many of these frames will be on the paintings for a very
long time. Some, when they're particularly successful, could still be
here in 200 years,' Schade says. If we're lucky, perhaps one of his
successors could be interviewed in time for NG400 - or perhaps not.

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