Gray or dark matt board.

[Robert Brummitt]

Recently at a Portland Photographers Forum we had Terry Thompson speaking and sharing his work. Terry's background includes an art education at the legendary School of Visual Arts in New York City, working with artists as diverse as Diane Arbus, Andy Warhol, Vido Acconci, Gary Winogrand, and Tad Yamashiro. Terry was a close friend to Imogen Cunningham.
During the lecture, Terry stated something that hit me as interesting and my memory kick in to another photographer I had met. Terry had said that he preferred to display his prints in an dark or even gray matt board. His reasons were that "White board creates a Backlight effect and takes away from the print." But, he said that museums and galleries only want white or off white boards because that is what is traditional and handed down from graphic arts. The other reason for White is that offers buyers a chance to change the window mat for their homes.
The other photographer I had met who said almost the same was Don Worth. I had seen a show of his in Palo Alto. His Black and white images were displayed in white but all is color work was matted in an 18% gray.
I took this information and looked into my photoshop program. As I'm sure you know you can change the working space from white to gray to black. I rotated one of my images and did see what both Terry and Don were aiming at.
As a color photographer, I'm thinking maybe I should start mounting images in Gray.
What do you think? Am I off my rocker or what?
I'm going to post this on several sites and cast a boarder net or thoughts.

[Robert Brummitt]

I made a simple jpeg using an image that has both light details and dark details. I digitally changed the matt color. I did noticed that my darks got more enhanced.

[domenico Foschi]

This need has been creeping in me as well.
Recently I have had the desire to matt my sepia work with 50% grey, 8 ply with a warm cast.
I have not made any research for availability yet.

[Bruce Barlow]

It's worth it to go to a craft store and get three cheap mats - white, gray, and black, and put identical prints in them just to see what they look like. I think ya gotta see your work in the different ones to know.

But it is a fascinating idea, given how long we've all been told that only white will do...

[Anupam]

It's strange but I find my BW scans look best on black on a monitor but with white matting as prints.

[Ken Lee]

Paintings and prints are generally framed and matted on an individual basis. Why not treat photographs in the same way ? Robert's example is very telling.

[windpointphoto]

Paintings and prints are generally framed and matted on an individual basis. Why not treat photographs in the same way ? Robert's example is very telling.

Exactly. We were doing this in the 70's. Matt for the print.

[wfwhitaker]

I chose a medium grey background for my website for much the same reasons. In the end, it's what appeals to you. Mats and html can be changed.

[Michael Graves]

I use both black and museum white....depending on the image. When I finally have an image I want to mount, I lay the print down on top of a board and see which one makes the image stand out better. White doesn't always win. No museum will ever be interested in me, so I don't care what they think.

[nolindan]

display prints in an dark or even gray matt board.

Watercolor painters normally mat their work using a mat that sets off the color of the painting's focus point or background.

My attitude is that whatever works, works.