Thursday, July 22, 2021

Decorating the walls

In our old house, before we made all the improvements prior to selling, we had lots and lots of oversized thrift-store prints on the walls.

While they were chosen because we like old-fashioned rural-themed prints, their real purpose was to hide the 11-foot-high walls, which were very ugly. That's why we had nothing short of a gallery of oversized prints.

Naturally all these prints were packed up and put in storage during the two years it took us to fix up the house, sell it, and move to our new place.

A few weeks ago when we opened the box truck after emptying the storage units in our old town, the prints were among the first things to come out. What fun it was to see them again! Like seeing a bunch of old friends.

But we also knew we couldn't use them all. Our new home is much smaller, nor do we have 11-foot ceilings in the living room as in our old place. Bottom line, it was time to assess our prints and determine which ones to keep.

So we wiped them down to remove the dust, and spread  them all over the house to get an idea of which ones we wanted to keep.

For a little while, our place resembled an art gallery.

Complete with canine art critic.

Eventually we got everything sorted, and Don installed hooks on the walls for hanging. We each selected a print to hang over our respective desks...

...and other prints are scattered around.

Eventually (probably over the winter) we're going to remove the upper kitchen cabinets (since they're too high for me to reach anyway) and that will allow room for artwork on the kitchen walls. So we stacked some of the prints aside for this purpose.

Other prints will eventually get hung on the bedroom walls.

We have one large print that will get hung in the larger bathroom...

...and we put a smaller print in the smaller bathroom.

With the exception of a signed print by the wildlife artist Sir John Seerey-Lester that I bought long before Don and I even met (probably worth about $250)...

...not one of our wall hangings has any value whatever. We just like them.

It's the little things that make a house a home, y'know? Including pictures on the walls.

12 comments:

  1. You're wrong when you say that none of your wall hangings have value. They have your affection and that's the highest value possible. Dollars be damned if they whisper thoughts that give you pleasure.

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  2. My wife is an artist and a very good one. We have no wall space left!

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  3. Walls just look welcoming when they tell stories to our imagination.

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  4. We hung prints from artists we knew personally as soon as we moved. We don’t have enough wall space so have to rotate prints but have several originals that stay up permanently. We work on the theory that it isn’t home unless the walls lean in from the weight of the pictures.

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  5. Those are lovely prints!
    My grandparents had the second one that you posted, the wagon pulled by two grey horses crossing the steam, and I absolutely loved it. Yours brings back precious memories.
    Sidetracksusie

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  6. Art should always be about what one likes, not what one perceives to be art.

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  7. I love your prints and am particularly amused by your canine art critic. So sweet. We also enjoy looking at "scenes of old" on our walls and actually have a couple of oil paintings of old bullock/horse teams from the original artist. We traded his work with mine - piano lessons for his daughter.
    It's great to see you settling into your new home. Love the updates. Jenny

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  8. "..not one of our wall hangings has any value whatever. We just like them."
    That makes them priceless Patrice.

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  9. I have several prints, large and small, by Paul Detlefsen. He is the creator of the print of the horse and wagon crossing the creek. I love his work. And also the other prints you've chosen.

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  10. Ok, this is a weird request, but if you ever decide to give up that print of the girl in the yellow dress reading the book, I would take that off your hands in a heart beat. My grandma had the same print hanging in her parlor in Oklahoma when I was a kid. Got a Nostalgic twinge when I saw that.

    Renee

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    1. My aunt -- now in her 90s -- gave me that print when I was a very young child. I've had it for over 50 years. I've always loved it, and it's hung on whatever wall of wherever place I've lived for all these years. I'm nostalgic about it too!

      - Patrice

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