The Writing on the Wall
Martha Stewart doesn’t live here, deadpans a buttercup-colored sign that hangs in my mother’s kitchen. It’s been glued back together down the middle. And on Etsy, one of a million inspirational posters coos Explore, the loops of letters written across an antique map of nowhere.
Long lyrics in frames, quotes misattributed (or simply not): The practice of writing on walls, or on sanded driftwood signs that are to be hung on walls, is our country’s personal statement in decorative form.
These word signs are everywhere, in duplicates all over Pinterest and in the stacks of T.J.Maxx stock rooms. They can be higher-brow, too: The pink FOR LIKE EVER graphic poster that graced an early Domino Magazine cover spawned a cult-like obsession amongst design types.
More: How to make royal blue “sun prints” from flowers and feathers.
The brand now sells a $64 version on their website, thusly described: “It’s a great combination of charm and edginess with a classic theme of love.” Just the thing your brownstone needs.
Higher-brow still, is in the foyer of the Ace Hotel in New York City: Two paces from their lobby— where you can order a $10 “appetizer” of bone broth garnished with pea shoots while tapping your foot to hip-hop music so loud it creates little rings of concentric beat-drops in your bowl—there’s a painted statement high on the wall.
Life delights in life. Does that mean come inside and buy a $20 glass of wine?(I did.) Or get a room? (I didn’t.) The thing about emblazoning someone else’s words where they didn’t ask you to put them: They lose their context. I doubt this is what William Blake meant when he wrote it in 1793—though then again, the name of the poem is America: a Prophecy.
More: A simple DIY for framing (and mounting!) posters and big prints.
Still, appropriation begets a lot of good art, from recipes to Warhols or poetry or musical theater: The tall guy in Newsies didn’t coin carpé diem, but we wouldn’t have the anthem Seize the Day without it. And while not everyone who hangs a little quote on her bedroom door means to forge a new art out of the words, the untethered nature of any wall quote is exactly what makes it strange—and possibly good.
For example, I have this gold leaf print of some Beatles lyrics that hangs on my wall, proclaiming, ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE! I wasn’t in love when I got it. It’s hardly my personal motto (because I also need shoes and fizzy water and chicken biscuits, for example). The Beatles weren’t, upsettingly, singing the lyrics to me.
Then why hang it up there?
First of all, to keep me level—I don’t ever want to be too grown up, too serious, too stodgy, too much of a pretentious ass to appreciate a wall quote. Its message, plain and proud, might not be cleverly obscured, but it says some things to me no matter how pedestrian I feel saying so. All you need is love, as in, don’t work too hard, don’t think too hard about your Instagram caption, don’t feel guilty that you bite your nails, don’t forget to call home, don’t tell everyone you’re *so busy*.
And second—less meaningful but perhaps more importantly—I hang it because it perfectly fills up that square foot of wall space where I want something to hang. It’s a weird, wonderful mix of gold and fuchsia (not at all my typical colors), and I like that it looks a little like a scream.
More: Ten ways to cover a blank wall that don’t require fancy art.
Words on walls might be plain and simple, so perilously lacking in context that they mean very little or all too much depending on who reads them—and they are definitely more suburban than hip. But I happen to delight in their frivolity, these non-sequiturs of wall decor. It’s only as weird as the practice of talking just to fill a quiet space.
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