The iFFALCON Wants to Shatter Samsung’s Hold on the ‘Art TV’ Market

It takes up a lot of wall space, don’t you know? That big-screen TV hanging on your wall. Or does 55″ even count as big anymore? Well, it’s bigger than any framed picture you’ve got mounted in your home, unless you’re an art student, a member of the 1% oligarchy, or a supervillain.

If only you could make use of all that wasted screen real estate when it was powered off. Ah, but you can. Samsung’s The Frame has been offering just that for years, with a stylish, picture-frame-like bezel and a collection of selectable art prints for display.

TCL is already one of my favorite TV brands, and now its sub-brand iFFALCON is taking on the TV-as-art segment with the Mural. And in true TCL fashion, it’s a far more affordable take on the niche than what Samsung is offering.

tv as art

Right off the bat, iFFALCON has attempted to make up for its brand name by naming its new TV the Mural, which—like the Samsung The Frame 4K TV—disguises itself as a blank picture frame, on which you can swap out your choice of digital art to display.

The Frame offers “3,500 curated artworks from more than 800 artists and 70 world-class galleries and museums,” as Samsung puts it, but we’ve got no word yet on how many iFFALCON is offering at launch.

Samsung has had eight years to build up that library of digital art prints, so I wouldn’t be surprised if iFFALCON’s coyness is because it could take some time to catch up.

Aside from the artsy fartsy talk, don’t forget that it’s also a TV, and one with decent specs, at that. The Mural has a 4K QLED display, a 93% DCI-P3 wide color gamut, and a 144Hz refresh rate, along with support for Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos. Rounding that out is the built-in Google TV streaming platform.

Wait a sec. Back to the name thing; what is up with that name? How am I supposed to pronounce it? “If Falcon?” “IffffFalcon,” as if I’m struck with hypothermia? Did they really want to name it iFalcon, but Tim Cook threatened to release the Kraken on them if they did?

At least it’s a minor issue. How often do you say the brand name of your TV, anyway?