The Samsung Frame Really Is a Work of Art
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SHOP $600 - $3,500, amazon.com
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For too many years, I lived in a Brooklyn apartment that felt like something out of Alice in Wonderland. The staircase up from the entrance was so off-kilter that it induced something approaching vertigo. Ditto that for the wildly uneven floors in the apartment itself, which made me—and everyone who visited—wonder if we'd accidentally dosed on something mildly psychedelic as we made our way from the kitchen to the bathroom. What I'm saying is: When I moved into my current spot, I was mostly looking for something level. The unrelenting sunlight pouring onto the only reasonable spot to put a television was the last of my concerns. Until, that is, the weekend after move-in, when I realized that watching Saturday morning cartoons with your kid is a lot harder when there's a blinding glare bouncing off the TV screen. Instead of turning my living room into a crypt with blackout curtains, I got a 65" Samsung Frame. It was absolutely the right call.
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About that screen
At this point, I'm not sure why anyone doesn't do a matte screen for a television. I know that the purported purpose of it is to display art more effectively—there's a reason this thing is called "The Frame," after all—but in practice, the most important thing about my new-ish TV is the fact that the screen is doing its thing when it's actually functioning as a television. I started out testing it with the curtains drawn. With my old TV, I would still catch slivers of reflection or glare. With The Frame? Nothing but sweet, sweet entertainment. True colors. Deep blacks. Exactly what you want, no futzing around with the picture required. Then I opened up the curtains. No change. Then, being the consummate professional that I am, I waited until the middle of a sunny Wednesday and put on 30 minutes of Bob's Burgers during lunch. Sitting in a sunbeam, turkey sandwich in hand, watching the family Belcher navigate the world without a single visual distraction, I realized I'd been missing out on the good life for far too long.
SHOP $600 - $3,500, amazon.com
Also...the art
Having grown up on cathode rays and small-but-boxy televisions, I have a deep appreciation for the ubiquity and relative affordability of impressively large flat-screens. Still, there's something soul-deadening about having a giant black pane occupying a large part of your environment when you're not watching John Wick for the umpteenth time. So, I'd be remiss in this review if I didn't mention the actual art you can display on The Frame. Mine came with Gustav Klimt's Oberösterreichisches Bauernhaus as the default image. You can also choose works from Monet, Manet, Pissarro, and others for free. (Does the "classic" selection of complimentary works lean impressionist? You bet it does!) Switching over to art mode instead of turning the TV off entirely has been the move since The Frame entered my home, and it's a nice way to keep the room feeling...nicer. You can also buy art, if you're looking for something more famous like The Starry Night. Is it worth paying $20 for that privilege when you've already got some lovely-to-look-at stuff from a bevy of masters for free? Not in my book. But it's your call.
SHOP $600 - $3,500, amazon.com
It's just easy
The prospect of moving from my old Roku-enabled TV gave me a bit of agita, I'll admit. Call it technological inertia; I was used to my old system, stuck in my ways. But installation was simple, and I find navigating around The Frame easier than anticipated, though a bit less intuitive. (If I ever get fed up, I can always just plug in a Roku device.) There's a suite of apps already installed, and downloading new ones isn't a hassle. The only real stumbling block, at first, was the remote, which decided it didn't want to pair with the television after a while. But after a network reboot and a full recharge—USB C, so I'm not worrying about whether I have fresh batteries squirreled away somewhere—it's been working just fine. The audio works just fine in my smaller space. And little conveniences, like the TV automatically detecting when I turn on my Nintendo switch and optimizing the setting for gaming, are extremely welcome. Now, whether I'm guiding Link through Hyrule, watching movies and cartoons, or just passing by a pretty-decent rendering of a Klimt painting, I find myself looking at my TV and thinking, "Damn, that thing really is nice." And isn't that exactly the point?
SHOP $600 - $3,500, samsung.com
Photography by Philip Friedman. Prop styling by John Olson for Halley Resources.
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