I end up having this discussion with most of my giclee clients when we are determining how to size the print in relation to the window in their mat, and was delighted to find this article by Brian Auer that both more concise and more thorough that my attempts. (While he is specifically discussing signing, the “visible border/no visible border” question is nicely covered.)
Making Fine Art Prints: Signing
Personally, most of my work is matted with white space so I can visibly sign, especially if it is an editioned print (I hand-write the title and print number/edition as well.) While for me this is mostly a hold-over from the “print it full frame with hand-filed border” technique of my art school days, I feel it is even more useful in the days of digital, as it is the most material evidence of the “hand of the artist” in my all-digital work. Some prints just don’t look right that way, and with my open-edition botanicals, I tend to do a bit of both depending on where I’m showing it.
