the tile factory

Quite awhile ago now, I worked in a place that made decorative plaster wall tiles, upon which were wreaked various faux finishes to make them look like wood or rusty metal etc. It was a neat job, everyone was an artist of one sort or another and although the pay was not great, the foreman was a poet who understood the artistic soul and so it was relatively painless to be there.

The tables we worked on were covered with brown craft paper, taped down with green masking tape. The paper became stained with use, covered with the silhouettes of tiles we laid down to work on. 70 tiles per table; 5 rows of 14.

One day I began to make paintings of my co-workers, using the materials at hand: black and silver markers, silver leaf, black and red paint, white wash, and the stain, a brown mixture of tar + solvents + other things which was used to give the plaster an aged effect. I painted directly on the tables, on the used craft paper just before it was to be thrown out and replaced with clean paper.

These are some of the paintings.







The thing is, although it was relatively painless to be there, that job was a bit of a trap. Many of the materials used were toxic - thus the masks. Lab coats and gloves to protect the skin, but in summer it was so hot... working 8 hours a day with solvents can be a drag!
Some found it difficult to leave this rather oddball job for work that could be higher-paying and certainly less toxic - but also more strict on the artistic soul.

The tile silhouettes on the paper look a bit like the bars of a cage, don't they?