Blog : Joe Curren

Send me your art, I’ll send it back to you framed …

Art framing combines two of my passions, art and woodworking. My interest in woodworking goes back to an an early age. My dad is a finish carpenter specializing in custom doors and cabinets. He also makes beautiful wood surfboards, boats and furniture. Inspired by my dad, for years I thought about trying my hand at woodworking but I always found an excuse — not enough time, space, tools, etc.

Things changed in 2003 when I was getting ready for my first photo exhibit. I found it very difficult to find the custom frames I wanted, which was something simple and clean with a handcrafted feel, and made from real wood. This made me think about making my own frames — I thought it would be a good way to display a complete package of my work and also an opportunity to finally start woodworking. So I bought a miter saw and a vise and made some frames in my garage. I enjoyed making those first frames, but, needless to say, woodworking and framing art was a lot more challenging than I thought. But, I kept at it, framing for further photo exhibits, improving with each show.

(l) salvaged old growth redwood, Port orford cedar — clear finish (r) poplar — white enamel finish

Then in 2009 my wife and I decided to move our home base from Santa Barbara to the redwood coast in Northern California. This move allowed me to have more space to work and put me near the source of the highest quality American hardwoods and the forests of the Pacific Northwest. In early 2011 I started working part time for Peter Kirkeby, a contemporary art framer in San Francisco. There I fine-tuned my skills and learned how to care for and frame a variety of mediums. Working for Kirkeby inspired me to start my own art framing business, and I now have a fully equipped, climate-controlled frame and wood shop and offer frames to the public.

I offer both “contemporary” and “craftsman” style frames in a variety of profiles and finishes. Contemporary frame profiles tend to favor contemporary and modern art, graphics and photography. Craftsman style profiles are made in the Arts and Crafts tradition especially suited for, but not limited to, craftsman bungalows and turn-of-the-century pictures and interiors.

My frames are “closed corner” frames. Closed corner, also known as finished corner frames, are joined then finished as a piece of furniture would be, rather than most frames today which are mass-produced, pre-finished moldings manufactured overseas.

For more details about my frames please click here. If you’re interested in getting your art or photographs framed, or if you have any questions feel free to email me at contact@joecurren.com.

I’ve noticed that Matt Warshaw’s forthcoming book The History of Surfing has a photograph of my dad Pat and his old friend John Elwell on its cover. My dad lived in Hawaii from ’57–’61. The photo is of he and Elwell checking the surf at Yokohama Bay on Oahu’s West Side taken by Surfer Magazine founder John Severson in 1957, the year Elwell visited my dad.

The following black and white portraits I took of Elwell this summer at his house on Coronado Island in San Diego, which is just down the coast from Mission Beach, my dad’s hometown. It was actually Elwell who introduced my parents to each other. Elwell met my mom (who also grew up in Coronado) when she was 16 and then introduced her to my dad at Wind N’ Sea in La Jolla. My dad asked my mom if she would go tandem surfing with him. The surf was about 8-feet that day but my mom, who’d never surfed before, agreed to go. The rest, as they say, is history.

Elwell holding a photo he took of my dad surfing Waimea Bay

From L to R, Elwell, a lady friend and my dad during their time camping on the beaches of the North Shore Photo: Tom Keck