After 20 years of collecting, I am the happy owner of myriad paintings, prints, inks, and three-dimensional artworks. But faced with the bare walls of my new home, I was suddenly at a loss. So I sought the expertise of Steven Platzman, an art scholar, dealer, and adviser (clients include museums, galleries, and big-name private collectors, as well as ordinary folks like me) who sells art through his Pacific Heights gallery, Addison Fine Arts. Platzman has an eye both for the work and its final resting place. His goal is to take fine art off its pedestal and put it where you can enjoy it most.

An artist friend once told me that paintings should be hung at eye level. Is that your rule of thumb?
There really is no correct way. A lot of people like to have the center of a work of art at eye level. But at six-foot-three, I like to hang it a little higher than someone who is five-foot-seven. Albert Barnes, a great collector of Impressionist paintings, had a house full of Renoirs and Cézannes that he hung in pyramid shapes.

You recently placed a Wayne Thiebaud painting on a corporate jet.
These days, a lot of businesspeople spend a good deal of time flying, and why shouldn’t they spend it looking at a Wayne Thiebaud? The workplace—an office or a corporate jet—is where you spend your time, so as long as you feel comfortable with the security and the physical environment, displaying art here is a great idea.

What about hanging art in really unconventional places, like the bathroom?
It depends on what bathroom you’re talking about. A regular bathroom may be too humid, but powder rooms don’t have that issue. There is a saying in the art world that if you really want to know how good a collector is, go to the downstairs powder room. It’s a great place to hang art.

I have a large David Slater painting in my living room that includes both a male and female nude. It used to be my sons’ favorite painting, but now my 11-year-old wants me to move it to someplace less public.
One of the wonderful things about bringing art into your house is that your children do look at it. That painting opens their minds a bit and presents an opportunity for you to explain your values, what you see, and why you have it up there. It’s a personal thing. I have clients with young children who feel that provocative art in public spaces is not appropriate until the kids grow up. Other clients feel the opposite. Your artwork, and where you choose to place it, really communicates who you are—your taste, style, wealth, and politics—more than anything else you own.

What’s the biggest mistake people make?
They don’t take into account the relationship art has to the other objects in the room. It doesn’t function independently; it’s an element of the interior. You need to consider the room’s volume and light, and the environment that you’d like to create.

What if you like eclectic interiors? How do you balance a Louis XIV chair with an abstract painting?
High-quality

objects can go in almost any interior. But the framing can alter the way a picture is perceived. For example, I have a 17th-century painting of St. Jerome by Guercino that has no frame, just a metal surround. It could hang in a very contemporary interior. Put an ornate frame on it, and it could go in a formal setting in Venice—or Pacific Heights.

In your gallery, a lot of paintings are on the floor. I worry that this endangers or denigrates the work.
I have a two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and I have a Matisse drawing on the floor. With the Plexiglas and frame, there is very little she can do that would damage it, except maybe set it on fire or throw it in the bathtub. If your child is likely to do something like that, I wouldn’t suggest putting a Matisse on the floor. Otherwise the floor is a safe place. We have sculpture on the floor, too—things that wouldn’t be damaged if they were knocked over.

Do you see more artwork on the floor here in laid-back California?
No, though it is a nice, informal way to display pieces you love. Placing art on the floor also gives you more room. One of the reasons collectors do it is because they’ve run out of wall space.

I notice you have gray walls in your gallery. Why not white?
I find white a little harsh. Grays and creams are more neutral and don’t interfere with works of art.

What about the walls in your home?
My wife, Julie Dowling, is a modernist architect, so our entire home is grays, tans, browns, and off-white. We like to allow the works of art to be the bold colors. But you can be more adventurous with color. The right color can really enhance an artwork.

Placing sculpture seems trickier than paintings.
People often have problems with sculpture because it occupies space, and in city apartments, space is at a premium. But sculpture adds three-dimensionality, depth, and richness to a room. Filling a room with only two-dimensional surfaces, like paintings, can make it feel flat. You can place sculpture in niches, on tables. I collect pre-Columbian art, which is ceramic and stone. It’s all over my home.

Do you let people touch your sculptures?
Absolutely. That’s part of what sculpture is about. Obviously, if an object is fragile or historically important, it probably shouldn’t be handled. But at home, you can touch the bronze Rodin, and the oils on your hand will create an attractive patina over time. That bronze head in my hallway by Jules Dalou, a contemporary of Rodin’s—I rub his nose all the time.