Dickinson's Quick Guide to Picture Hanging

The Situation

First, one must decide where to hang a picture. Where would it appear most at home? Think about the colours in the painting or the subject it depicts to help determine this. A still life of fruit, for example, would work well hung in a kitchen or dining room while a large landscape might be better suited to a sitting room. Similarly, brightly coloured paintings add lively energy to rooms used most frequently during the day, such as a kitchen or family space, whereas pictures with more soothing palettes lend themselves to the calming environment of a bedroom.

In more practical terms, the chosen room will need to be able to comfortably accommodate the size of an artwork – that is to say, a wall must be long enough for the width of the picture. Moreover, the fabric of the building will need to be capable of taking the weight of the picture. Whilst most modern walls, finished with plasterboard, can easily hold the average painting, an understanding of and confidence in a wall’s construction is important when hanging particularly heavy artworks.

In choosing the hanging location, you should also consider how much light the picture would be exposed to, whether that be artificial light such as from overhead spotlights and lamps or daylight through windows. The last thing you want to do upon purchasing a new artwork is to hang it somewhere it could get damaged, so taking the time to consider the conditions of the room is important.

The Arrangement

Once a new home from your painting has been established, you should think about what might hang alongside it. Perhaps you are using your new purchase as an opportunity to re-hang a whole wall or an entire room. You should, however, think of your artworks not only in relation to one another but also in relation to the furniture in your room. There are several options available; we’ve outlined a few of the most popular ones below.

Centrepiece:

Hanging an artwork as a standalone piece is perhaps most common choice and certainly makes the most visual sense when hanging on smaller elevations. Individual paintings work well above fireplaces and sideboards or other large items of furniture, for example, and help to create a focal point within a room. In settings like these, position the painting so that it sits centrally above the full width of your architectural feature or furniture. In terms of height, particularly when there isn’t anything on or against the wall to use as a guide, hanging pictures at eye-level is a good rule of thumb; keep the mid-point of your picture roughly 150-160 cm from the floor and you can’t go far wrong.

In general terms, the format of your painting (whether it is portrait or landscape) should roughly mirror the format of your wall; a portrait-format painting hung alone on a long wall will quickly appear as though it is floating. If portrait-format artworks are all you have, grouping them can help avoid this postage-stamp look.

Grouping:

Grouping pictures not only gives you more creative freedom in terms of the arrangement of your pictures but also allows you to juxtapose artworks of differing periods or styles for a truly unique interior.

Hanging a group of pictures is all about balance. If you’re hanging a set of prints symmetrically or a mix of artworks asymmetrically, it is important to keep the visual weight of the pictures balanced across a centre line (whether that be the centre of your wall or a piece of furniture etc.) One must also think about the space between the pictures - this is often a matter of trial and error to establish the right balance; after all, you want to see more picture than wall. It may help to mark out the dimensions of the wall space on the floor and rearrange your pictures until you are happy, before then transferring the desired arrangement to the wall itself.

Over-and-Under:

This arrangement involves hanging two pictures of unequal size together and works particularly well on narrow elevations or as pairs either side of a central feature (e.g. a bed, a chimneybreast or a cupboard). As a general rule, larger pictures sit better above smaller ones (rather than the other way around); it is both more balanced and gives greater opportunity to study the detail of smaller works at close quarters. As with larger groups of pictures, pairing paintings of differing styles can work well, so long as the balance of the works is maintained.