> It’s impossible to mount even lightweight items such as picture frames onto the wall, because even the tiniest hole from nails or the like would crumble and erode into dust.

The trick for this is to just find the stud. Same thing you'd have to do in drywall. For light stuff like photos, you can get away with putting a nail right into the lathe without having to find a stud. If you miss the lathe (you can tell) just move the nail up a half inch.

Ha! If I even look at my lath and plaster walls the wrong way a little bit crumbles away.