This book is not for everyone. It is for the young at heart, of
whatever chronological age, those who are adventurous, creative,
and who, despite limited financial resources, are strongly motivated
to enriching their lives and their homes with beauty. If you fulfill
these qualifications, come along with me on a journey which, if it
does for you what it has already done for me, will exceed your
wildest expectations. But first, a few words about me and how this
book came to be written. . .
TSR

INTRODUCTION
by Elaine Raynolds
“Art on a Shoestring”
a book by Thelma S. Rado, photo illustrations by Elaine Raynolds

IN THE BEGINNING;
I grew up in New York City and lived with my mom in a three-room apartment in Elmhurst, Queens. There was a bedroom, a kitchen, and a living room. The rooms were connected by a long hall with the bathroom at one end and the front door at the other. In the seventies my mother had the opportunity to move to McMinnville, Oregon into her dad’s home when he passed away. She was retired by this time and so she “sprouted wings.” She decided that it would be fun to redecorate her new “massive” living quarters every 30 days. These living quarters actually consisted of a three-bedroom, one bath house with a fenced in backyard. But this was more living space than she had most of her
adult life. In 1976 I moved with my family to Clearwater, Florida. Pretty much every year, after my children were in school, I would hop a plane and spend part of my vacation from work with my mom in Oregon. Sometimes we would go sightseeing, sometimes shopping, sometimes she would have work around the house or projects that she would have ready for my arrival. In the later years, sometimes she was sick and I would spend my vacation taking care of her or visiting her in the hospital.

MOTHER’S HOBBY;
But every year when I visited, the first priority was to tour her house with its current “exhibit” of pictures and furnishings. I always enjoyed seeing what she had done. What was Mother’s hobby? Well, she loved to decorate, she was retired on a fixed income, but she was very creative. She started to figure out all sorts of inexpensive, often free, forms of art that she could assemble to completely redecorate her new, spacious home every thirty days. She hired students to help with the process and kept her hobby going for more than eighteen years until her health motivated her to move back east to be closer to me. As the years past and the collection became substantial, mother thought that some university or agency would be interested in taking it over or even continuing her hobby. She became frustrated when she could not find such an interest and one year when I came to visit expressed her frustration by saying nobody cares. To quiet her anger, I blurted out, “so maybe if you write a book they’ll understand what you are doing!” I took her breath away, at least for the moment. When she had processed in her mind what I had just said, she responded, “how would I do that?” I reminded her that she had been doing night lecturing at the community college for years, had drawers and drawers full of files, just organize what she was doing and start writing it down. The next morning we went down town to the office supply store, bought a supply of file folders, pens, paper, and a notebook for her to sort her materials into. Back home, we sat down together and discussed a possible outline of how to organize her book. I suggested that she just tell a story of what she does from the time she finds a picture, decides what color mat to put on it, what frame to put it in, then when and where to hang it when it is all ready.

A BOOK BEGINS TO TAKE SHAPE;
It was time for me to return to my home in Clearwater. I encouraged her to work on her book over the next year and when I came to visit we would work on it some more. True to my word, I traveled to Oregon the next summer and was eager to see what she had done with her book project. When I arrived she was exhausted and meekly admitted to me that she really hadn’t been working on it until it was close to my arrival and had been burning the midnight oil to have “something” to show me when I arrived. The worst part for me was jet lag. I, too, was exhausted and ready to get sleep. She wanted me to read over her manuscript immediately. We compromised. As soon as I woke the next morning refreshed, I got to work. There wasn’t that much, but it surely was a good start, and from what I read I realized that I could once again be helpful to her in her project - by taking photographs of the different things that she was talking about. She loved the idea and so we began with page one and set up photo illustrations as we went from page to page in her story. My vacation time sped by and it was time to return home. I took the photos and her handwritten script with me. I told her that I would type everything out, insert the pictures and mail the draft to her as soon as I could get it typed. For three years I mailed typed drafts and for those three years she mailed back corrections, changes and additions. I knew when I volunteered for the job it would be a challenge. Finally she ran out of changes, so with a great sigh, I paginated the manuscript and sent her the entire book. She decided to proudly show it off to her brother, who was the book editor of National Geographic...bad idea. He liked it, told her she did a great job...but.

NOW WE’RE READY TO PUBLISH!
We were back to the drawing board, attempting to incorporate all of his changes and suggestions, but that was okay. He had good ideas, but some of them required major changes and that was hard for me. This entire project was done before I had a computer or any knowledge of how to use one, so every word, every change and correction was typed and retyped by hand at my trusty, dusty typewriter...til we were once again...done. From that time until now, the book has lived restlessly in a looseleaf notebook, on a book shelf waiting to be published. Mother didn’t want to spend the money to self publish and we couldn’t really help. Worse still, the one publisher friend I talked to said he would need the book on a computer disc and I had no clue what he was talking about at the time. Mother passed away in March 2000, but thanks to very dear friends, the book has finally been put on a disc and is hot off the publisher’s presses!

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Dedication
Foreword
Introduction
Chapters
I. An Idea is Born
II. Choosing the Right Picture
III. Mounting and Matting
IV. Creating Unusual Mats
V. Framing
VI. Hanging Pictures
VII. Understanding Color
VIII. Choosing a Color Scheme
IX. Learning the Principles of Good Design
X. Arranging Furniture
XI. Solving Knotty Household Problems
XII. Putting it all Together - The Total Picture
XIII. Conclusion

Chapter III
21. Selecting mats at the frame shop
22. Wallpaper
23. Mexican frames
24. Frame within a frame - front and back
25. Size of Mat
25a. The Rabbet
Chapter IV
26. Contour mat - lion head
27. Extension over mat - the dog
28. Telephone directory - without a mat
29. Telephone director - with a mat
30. Diptych and triptych for small pictures
31. Preparing a mat
32. Placing a mat
33. The matted picture
Chapter V
34. Tools
35. Turnbuttons - TSR and Barbie
36. Turnbuttons - double wire
Chapter VI
37. Formal picture arrangement around a mirror
38. Another formal picture arrangement around a mirror - TSR bedroom
39. Asymmetrical picture arrangement over a large case piece
40. Asymmetrical picture arrangement over a sofa
41. Asymmetrical picture arrangement - TSR hall
42. Bookcase arrangement

43. Bathroom - bathtub arrangement
44. Bathroom - window arrangement
45. Picture arrangement over counter, stove, and refrigerator
46. Kitchen - use of correlated wallpapers
47. Arrangement around double doors
48. Arrangement in corner
49. Arrangement around corner
50. Balancing an off-center window
51. Picture arrangement around a window
52. Hanging a picture over a curtain
Chapter VII
53. Color Wheel
Chapter VIII
54. Red wall in the hall
Chapter IX
55. Fireplace - asymmetrical balance
56. Living room sofa - asymmetrical balance
Chapter X
57. Room floor plan - axis line
58. Example of repetition and variety - TSR Dining room
Chapter XI
59. Window extension to correct an off-center window
60. TSR bedroom - towel curtains
61. TSR bedroom - wallpaper headboard
62. Purse hook
63. Pedestal - closed
64. Pedestal - open
65. Tweed lounge chair
66. Turquoise bedroom chest
67. Kitchen cabinet light garden
Chapter XII
68. “Art on a Shoestring Gallery”
69. Front of the house
70. Living room - sofa and window walls
71. End of sofa wall with chair next to hall
72. Dining room
73. Den - sleep sofa wall
74. Den - music center
75. Small bedroom
76. Master bedroom

CHAPTER I
An Idea is Born
What, you may well ask, is art on a shoestring? In most countries, a shoestring is relatively cheap. So
art on a shoestring is a special kind of fine art which is available to anyone and everyone at little or no cost; it is
found in the most unexpected places by people whose awareness has been sharpened by learning what to look
for, where to look for it, and what to do with it once they have found it. It is a quest as exciting as a treasure hunt,
with enticing rewards and a sense of great satisfaction, and as your awareness of what is beautiful in art
increases, that awareness will spill over to enhance your appreciation of the beauty of everything else in your
life.

Unfortunately there are uncounted multitudes of people out there who yearn to enrich their lives and
their backgrounds for living with something beautiful to hang on their walls, but who feel they simply cannot
afford to pay the prices of original paintings offered by galleries or art stores, so they end up frustrated, bereft,
or both. The truth of the matter is that none need be either frustrated of bereft, since there is a world of fine art
by well-known and accepted painters and photographers waiting to be found, most of which is free for the
asking, the rest to be had for a ridiculously low cost. Your only investment: a little time and effort at the outset,
until your eye begins to see the possibilities in pictures you might never even have noticed before; once you have
created your first art work from something many people unthinkingly might have consigned to the trash-bin, the
thrill and joy of success will carry you on to ever greater accomplishments, and you will be amazed at how simple
it is to surround yourself with the beauty you’ve always yearned for.

How do I know? Because I’ve been there. This book is a compilation of some of the things I’ve learned along the way, shared with you in the hope that they may start the windmills of your mind to churn more creatively.

I have been luckier than most; my mother’s side of the family were all fine artists, and almost before I
had learned to read, from watching my mother paint, I already knew the difference between cerulean blue and
alizarin crimson. Long before Hawaii became a state, my family moved to Honolulu, a painter’s paradise, for six
years. After completing high school in three years, and after studying for three years at the University of
Hawaii, I moved to New York City to attend Barnard College as an exchange student for my last year, and
graduated with a B.A. degree. Marriage and a daughter intervened before I received a scholarship to, and a
diploma from, the prestigious Parsons School of Design, after which I worked for a number of interior decorators
before opening my own business. Several years later I went back to school to earn a Master’s Degree in
Art Education, and for the next eighteen years taught Art in the N.Y.C. school system and Interior Design for
two years at the Newark School of Interior Design in New Jersey. Upon retirement in 1975, I moved out to
McMinnville, Oregon, where for many years my father had been a Professor at Linfield College. On one of my
visits to Oregon, I had fallen in love with his house, and, when he became unable to maintain it, I bought it from
him for my retirement home.

One of its main attractions for me had been its open-plan arrangement and, for a small house, its large,
uninterrupted wall spaces, virtually crying out to be filled with beautiful art. But in my overcrowded New York
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City three-room apartment, I had hung only about ten pictures, all originals of fine quality, but a motley group of
non-related subjects. I would need a lot more pictures to fill the seven rooms of my new home. But the move
across country from New York to Oregon would be expensive, and before I could move in, the house would have
to be painted both inside and out, carpeting and linoleum replaced, alterations made in both kitchen and bath,
additional furniture bought, so there would be little or no money left for the purchase of pictures to decorate the
walls. But where there’s a will, there’s a way. I had the will. Now all I had to find was the way.

I began by looking for, and at, any calendars I could find hanging on the walls of any building or office in
my city. Many of these calendars were quite ordinary, but when I saw something that really appealed to me, I
asked the person who owned the calendar to put my name on it and reserve it for me at the end of the year, and
I would come back for it. Most people I spoke to said they just threw their calendars away, anyway, so agreed
to my request. Some of the most beautiful, and largest, calendars I have framed have come from the Tax
Assessor’s office and the local Water and Light Department! I looked at the new calendars, too; even if the
calendar cost $6.95, and I could use only six of the pictures in it, my cost per print was only a little over one dollar,
and if I could use all twelve, my cost per print dropped to a mere 58 cents, a real bargain. Decorative placemats
can be framed beautifully, and none will ever know (unless you tell them) that they are placemats; when you tire
of them as pictures, they can always be taken out of the frame and used as placemats again. Linen tea towels
with scenes, bird or animal prints on them can also be framed, as can fabric scenic design prints. Look at
decorative wrapping paper in any stationery or gift store and in art museums; I’ve found that imported gift
wrapping is more suitable for framing, either by the full single sheet, or, if the design permits it, divided in the
middle for a pair of framed prints.

Other sources to try would be all sorts of magazine covers and illustrations, Reader’s Digest covers, greeting
cards, even wallpaper books, particularly the ones with murals. And if you still come up short, there are always
Figure 1













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posters and fine reprints and reproductions which can be ordered from an array of catalogues to be found in
most framing shops; although these may cost a bit more than the items above, they are still priced within reason.
You may not find what you are looking for overnight, but you will become increasingly aware, as you continue
your search, that the range of sources is limitless, based on your ingenuity to locate them.

As my collection grew, I began to acquire enough pictures in the same category of subject matter (whether
Seascapes, Trees, Woodland Creatures, Still Lifes, etc., etc.) to comfortably fill one room of my house, so at first
Figure 2
I hung a different category in each of the seven rooms. While this proved interesting for a while, I gradually
became dissatisfied with the lack of relationship between the rooms, and found that by using a central theme in
all seven rooms, I could achieve a greater sense of integration and harmony throughout.

By this time the trickle of accumulation had become a deluge and my storage space was running out, so
I moved my car out of my one-car garage, had floor to ceiling shelves built around all four walls, added several
cabinets and a large worktable, laid carpet over the cement floor, and voila, had a working and workable Studio! Another storage plus I discovered was that often even more than ten pictures of the same size could be “stored” in a single frame, depending on the size of the rabbet (the space between the back of the glass and the back of the frame, or the depth of the frame). In some frames the rabbet will only hold two or three matted pictures, while in others with deep rabbets, 20 to 25 pictures can be held, thus noticeably cutting down on the amount of
shelf space required (to hold one frame instead of 25 frames). Most people put one picture in the frame, close it
up, then hang it on the wall and never take it down or move it. I store a quantity of pictures in one frame, put turn
buttons on the back so that the pictures can be easily reached and rotated as needed, using the same frame over
and over again in various central themes and in different rooms as called for. I will explain later in the book how
this ingenious procedure can be adapted so that the average home-owner can get double or triple use out of each
of his frames.
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clinics; most of them not only have interesting pet calendars but will let you have a stack of their out-dated Cat
and Dog Fancy Magazines, which also have excellent pictures for framing.

The wonderful thing about calendars is that they come in all shapes and sizes, from the huge ones with
the very large picture and the 12-month calendar all on a single page, down to the smallest ones with vividly
painted and often beautifully detailed pictures by disabled artists who must hold the brush in their mouth or with
their feet, with every size in between, both vertical and horizontal (though usually not in the same calendar).
Another advantage that calendars have is that, if you find one with related subject matter by the same artist or
photographer, you have a head start for an interesting and homogeneous grouping or wall treatment.

Keep an open eye on the poster racks of your department stationery, and expanded drug stores. Import
Plaza, Pier Imports, and such stores usually carry a large selection of assorted-size posters at reasonable prices.
Museums also sell posters of art works they own and display, and while these cost a bit more, they are by
renowned artists and of fine quality. Write or call the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and the
Boston Museum of Fine Arts in Mass. and ask them to send you their booklet of posters for sale; they also sell
beautiful engagement books, with illustrations suitable for framing, and if you don’t mind framing miniatures, a
large selection of note cards which can be matted up to a larger size. Whenever you shop for posters, try to find
them to fit standard-size frames; however, if the poster is too small, often it can be matted up to a larger
standard-size frame, and if it is too large, often it can be cut down without losing any of the subject.
Figure 4
Pictured here, top: Ken Michaelson’s “Australian Black
Swan” from Sebastiani Vineyards. Pictured to the left: Luc
Genot’s surrealistic “Le Guerrier.” I saw this first in Alaska --------- Figure 5---------

 

 

 

and fortunately found it at my local expanded drug store when I got back to Oregon. Another good source is the Reader’s Digest (see Fig. 6 mounted; Fig. 7 matted; and Fig 8 framed); their back covers are miniatures of larger paintings by many well-known










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