24 
House & Garden 
THE ART OF HANGING PICTURES 
Their Relation to the Color and Furniture Arrangement of the Room as Illustrated 
in the New York House of Albert Sterner , Esq. 
A Background for Art 
It is well to choose a good 
background as a setting for art 
objects, and in so doing it is 
G OOD pictures are often 
spoiled in the hang¬ 
ing, just as good plays in 
the acting. No one who 
has suffered from the un¬ 
pleasant effects of a crowded 
mass of canvases in heavy, 
ornate gold frames, jostling 
one another on a too small 
wall space, will ever forget 
the sense of hopeless irrita¬ 
tion which ensues. Any 
interest in art one might 
otherwise have had is suc¬ 
cessfully stifled and, of 
course, the effectiveness of 
the decoration of the room 
is utterly destroyed. 
Nowhere but in a gallery 
set aside for that purpose 
should canvas after canvas 
be placed in rows, and even 
there they must be arranged 
according to some carefully 
considered decorative plan. 
It would seem that it re¬ 
quires an artist not only to 
paint pictures, but to give 
them their appropriate set¬ 
ting. The residence of 
Mr. and Mrs. Albert Sterner 
most happily illustrates this 
fact. There they have cre¬ 
ated an ideal background 
for Mr. Sterner’s work, and 
have so placed the canvases 
that they become an inte¬ 
gral part of the decoration. 
The simply paneled 
walls painted an elusive 
gray-green, are a pleasing 
and flattering milieu for 
objets d’art and people 
alike. Due consideration 
has been given the pictures, 
as to their size, character 
and coloring in relation to 
the scale of the walls and 
the furniture. 
The Simple Rules 
In fact, careful study of the 
methods used w 7 ill be sufficient 
to evolve a number of perfectly 
simple rules about what to do 
with one’s pictures. To begin 
with—if they are worth while 
hanging at all, and that is far 
from a negligible point—they are 
worth showing and they should 
never, except in the case of over 
doors, be placed much above the 
level of the eye. 
Another axiom is that the 
wire or cord used should not be 
visible. In this way they seem 
to become an actual part of the 
wall decoration, rather than an 
additional ornament. 
It is also true that in hang¬ 
ing, the frames should not be 
tilted forward so as to be out 
of line with the wall. 
Flarting 
As an over-mantel decoration in the simply paneled dining room, painted gray- 
green, is a life-size portrait of young Harold Sterner. The carved iron screen'is 
by Htmt Diederich 
The top of a set of book shelves serves as a convenient space for small 
bibelots and drawings so placed that they may be easily scrutinized 
The right lighting is, of 
course, essential and this 
may require no end of re¬ 
arrangement. Sufficient 
breathing space should be 
given each picture. In fact, 
a single canvas of good size 
needs quite a good deal of 
wall space, and it is only in 
the case of small etchings, 
water colors or drawings, 
that they should ever be 
hung in groups. 
The clever arrangement 
of small pictures into a 
well balanced series is an 
achievement. A very inter- 
e s t i n g collection of old 
needlework and water colors 
of panier fleuri, some framed 
in oval frames, we have seen 
arranged most delightfully, 
and because of this fact they 
were a joy to behold rather 
than a tiresome, jumbled 
mass which they might oth¬ 
erwise have been. Five or 
six were hung on one wall, 
with a duplicate arrange¬ 
ment on the opposite wall. 
Small Drawings 
Of course, another pos¬ 
sibility with small drawings 
is to place them on a low 
shelf, as in the case of the 
Sterner house. Here at one 
side of the drawing room a 
low series of book shelves 
has its top shelf as a con¬ 
venient place for small fig¬ 
urines, boxes and drawings, 
particularly drawings which 
require close scrutiny. These 
may be easily «picked up 
and examined. 
The artist realizes that it 
is useless to hang a small 
drawing where it may be seen 
only in the dim distance, just 
as it is quite absurd to allow a 
huge canvas to crowd itself into 
a small space without allowing 
an opportunity for the proper 
perspective. 
Prints, architectural or myth¬ 
ological, which do not require 
close study, with their super¬ 
ficially graceful designs of either 
the Italian or French school, are 
appropriate for hallways and 
for small anterooms where one 
may stop simply en passant. 
Small prints of this sort would, 
of course, not be appropriate for 
a huge living room where more 
important canvases would look 
their best. 
