A Scratch and Dental Meditation

A good picture framer always strives to send out finished framing jobs as close to perfection as is humanly possible.  The frame must be flawless, the glass must be sparkling, and the matting must be free of any stray specks or cat hairs (heh heh heh).  With a shop cat in residence, my frames always leave in pristine condition, even if I have to take them apart several times and redo them.  My shop may be an unholy mess but my frame jobs are always impeccable in the end.

Several years ago I framed a show for one of my very favorite photographers.  It hung at the Burchfield-Penney so the smooth black frames with their brilliant white matting arrived at the gallery in mint condition.  Some of the pieces were sold but most of the frames were stored until she brought them back to me to be re-used for her upcoming exhibition at Nichols School.

At first glance, it appeared as though we had fifteen good used frames and needed only five new ones for the new show.  Upon closer examination, however, most of the original frames had suffered due to moving, jostling, and storage.  There were many scratches and dents which could not be repaired.

I messaged her: 

 

Good news versus bad news. Of the 15 frames you brought in, I can really only reuse 3 - the rest are scratched and gouged all to pieces - and as picky as you are about your printing, so am I picky about your frames. The good news is all 15 mats/glass/backings are OK.

She pondered this over the weekend and phoned me the following Tuesday.  We decided that if it were possible, I would make the frames even more scratched and dented—all of them.  All twenty of them.

Backstory:  the photographer is Missy Kennedy Cleary, known far and wide for her amazing photographs of children, women, families, horses and dogs.  Dogs are her special passion—she is surely a dog whisperer; and she has long been associated with the Erie County SPCA.  Every animal she has photographed for them finds forever homes as soon as the portraits go up on their website.

 

In the shelter world, animals who have been longtime residents of the system (through the fault of their own horrid or unknowable backstories) become harder and harder to place the longer they are in residence.  They lose hope, hang back, hiding from potential adopters—they have given up on ever finding their own humans to love.  Some shelters call these dejected creatures the “scratch and dents”—they are perfectly good on the inside but maybe not be “show ring” perfect on the outside.  They need a little work and a lot of patience and love.  And that’s when Missy steps in and brings out the best in them.  Missy sees beneath the sadness and fear and soon enough hopeful eyes and uppy ears and even the hesitant wag of the tail appear and, as if by magic, their lingering suspicions are completely erased.  Her unconditional love and photographic expertise bring out the best in any creature she has ever photographed (well, except for my parents—but that is another story for another day).

For this show Missy collected all of her favorites and had way too much fun playing with them in Photoshop—going into full Lichtenstein/Warhol mode with a riot of color and texture—or echoing vintage etchings with just a hint of line and shape and tone.

 

It took me a while to find the perfect tool for the "scratch and dental" procedure.  I consulted my framer friends from around the world, and one homemade tool worked especially well on my sample of moulding.  After all these years of producing perfection, I must admit I had fun beating up these frames.  And they turned out great. 

Mama Lucy, Shop Cat, tried to help with the scratching part.

Framing wire strung with every bolt in my collection did the trick.

I adore all of these photographs, but here are some of my very favorites.  I wonder if one day my kitties would  allow me to adopt a dog.

All ready for the show!

Missy and her daughter picked up all twenty of the frames and loaded them into the back of her SUV.  The next day she was to deliver them to the school for the show.  Unfortunately, the next morning is when I received this message from her:

 

Had a complete catastrophe

6 came flying out of the car and broke

I want to jump off a cliff

Oh noes!

 Luckily for all, back when I was still seeking absolute perfection, I had ordered extra of these smooth black frames and as it turns out, I had exactly six, all ready to be beaten up and fitted.  Only one mat was lost, two pieces of glass were shattered, and none of the prints were damaged at all.  Whew!  MarGyver triumphs again!

 

Good Golly, Miss Molly

If it is true as it is said that one of the reasons the Creator gave us dogs was to make us laugh and lighten our spirits, then Molly was indeed a gift from above.

She was an adult Basset hound of indeterminate age when we acquired her as a companion for our inexplicably nervous and skinny young Basset Mandy.  Molly was the exact opposite of nervous—she was enormous, weighing over ninety pounds and in possession of a long patrician snout, magnificent silky ears and a chest which looked downright seaworthy (we used to call it her prow).  Her ears were so long and her legs were so stubby she used to step on her ears when she walked.

Molly came from Michigan and traveled cross-country when we moved back to the Niagara area.  With two Basset hounds, two cats, two gerbils, and two hippies in our painted VW microbus—it was a long strange trip indeed.  We ended up in Hamilton, Ontario with a fenced-in back yard and a spot for the enormous dog house Paul had built for the dog run back in Michigan.  Mandy was so nervous about the adorable children next door that she wore a trench around the outside of the yard with her pacing (when she was not trying to hide in the dog house) but Molly just sat there soaking up the hugs and adoration.  (It still amazes me that later when Paul sold Mandy to a young couple with young children she became a completely different dog.)

Molly adored everyone and everyone adored her.  I am sure if we had thought of it at the time, we could have spent hours dressing her up in scarves and pearls, feather boas and shawls and she would have just sat there enjoying the attention.  Molly also loved going for car rides.  One day Paul’s brother had come for a visit and after a couple of hours, headed out to the driveway and his VW Beetle.  As soon as he opened his door, Molly jumped into the back of the car, landing on the floor, of course.  We called her out.  She sat down, an immovable object, with the “hump” between her front and back legs.  One of us pushed from the rear and another of us pulled from the front and still she would not budge.  Paul’s brother was forced to take her for a brief ride around the block before she deigned to exit the vehicle.

I was home alone one afternoon and decided that Molly needed a bath.  It was struggle but I finally managed to lever her into the bath tub.  Once she was all nice and clean she was ready to exit the tub.  I stepped back and said to her, “Jump out, Molly!”  She looked at me like, Yeah—right.  I realized I had a problem—a great huge slippery wet dog problem.  I could barely maintain a grip on her much less lift her out of the tub.  We compromised and I finally managed to lift her front end and slide her across the edge of the tub (not unlike a toboggan on a snowy slope) until she landed in a rather undignified heap on the bathroom floor.  But she didn’t seem to mind at all—she was happy to go back outside and find fresh dirt to roll in.

One day Paul decided he did not want Molly eating in the dining room with us.  He placed her metal roasting pan full of kibble in the laundry room.  Molly was insulted by this.  It seems she figured—if we ate in the dining room—she would eat in the dining room!   We sat down for supper one night and Molly appeared by the table with the strangest expression on her face.  Her cheeks were bulging like a chipmunk’s.  I looked her in the eye and asked her, “Molly, do you have a mouth full of kibble?”  She gazed back with sheer innocence so we pretended to look away (trying not to laugh).  Once she seemed confident that we were no longer staring at her, she surreptitiously spat a heap of kibble onto the floor (Ptui! Ptui! Ptui!) which she proceeded to eat in a most delicate ladylike fashion.  From then on, Molly was allowed to eat with us in the dining room whenever she wished.

When I began what was to be my most illustrious and long-lived career as a picture framer, Paul decided that Molly would be lonely by herself all day and he rehomed her.  And that was that.  No more Molly.

Many months later Paul informed me that we were going on a road trip to visit an old friend of mine.  “Is it a childhood friend?” I asked, “Someone I went to college with?”  He steadfastly refused to tell me who we were to visit as we drove further and further down winding country roads and up and down shallow hills and valleys.  It was the middle of winter and the snow lay deep in the bare woods.  We finally arrived at a small house at the edge of the road, and much to my embarrassment and horror, Paul made me go to the door alone and knock.

I heard her barking before she pushed the door open—it was Molly!  She was overjoyed to see us.  She looked great, and the new owner told us she had not lost several of her unusual skills—turns out she frequently hoovered up unopened tins of the cat’s food and carried them around the house a bit before spitting them out unharmed.  It was so wonderful to see how happy and well-loved she was.  And before we left them, Molly performed her famous feat of heaving her bulk into the air unaided and I captured it on film.

   

“Molly—up!”

“Good girl.” 

Molly (Hand-coloring by Kim Wilson)

Rest in Peace Sundance

Rest in Peace, Sundance

Shut Up Precious!

We have a small back alley behind the shop with a broken stockade fence between our alley and the next back yard.  There is a dog in that yard and her name is "Shut Up Precious!" as far as I can tell because she barks at everything that moves - sometimes she barks at me when I am inside the shop and I make a noise in the back room.

She sticks her head through the break in the fence and just stares and stares at me - and she is a dog with no short-term memory at all.  I can bring one bag of garbage out to the totes and she goes nuts and I say hello to her and go back inside for more stuff to bring out and when I hit the alley she goes nuts all over again.

Her mommy told me that Shut Up Precious! couldn't even remember the neighbor on the other side who used to give her treats every day.  She runs up the back steps and tries to see me over the fence but most of the time she just tries to get her head through the break.

 

I told Shut Up Precious! that I was taking her picture so I could make her famous on the Interweb but I doubt very much if she will remember our conversation.