By late afternoon, the horse portrait stops looking decorative and starts working. The room settles and the orange coat and soft pink fence start doing the job of a colour accent you would otherwise have to buy in cushions. A blank hallway wall stops feeling like a corridor. A plain bedroom gets a focal point at last. Hang it on a wall with nothing else on it, at eye level or just above a low chest, and let the width of the paint marks carry. Keep the things around it simple: painted wood, linen, one plant, a glazed pot. Do not crowd it with other bright pictures or busy patterned wallpaper, and do not tuck it behind a tall lamp. As a canvas the thick paint marks read as texture from a step back.