Many Hands

MOHAMMED RAHMAN I felt in very safe hands while we were installing my exhibition, and I’m in awe of the knowledge you’ve amassed over the years. What are the most memorable projects you’ve worked on here?

ROGER MURRAY Cornelia Parker’s Cold Dark Matter 1991 is really fascinating to install. To make it, the artist collected a huge number of household objects and put them into a garden shed. It was then taken down to the British Army’s School of Ammunition in Warwickshire, packed with explosives and blown up. All the pieces were then collected and stored. When the artwork goes on display, these fragments are individually strung up on wires at different heights and distances from a big light bulb hanging in the middle of the room, making it appear as if the shed is mid-explosion. It’s a moment caught in time. It’s fiddly, but at the same time it has to look spontaneous, which is a tricky but fun thing to do.

LIAM TEBBS I worked on dock 2014, which was a massive installation by Phyllida Barlow that filled the central Duveen galleries at Tate Britain. It was made up of all sorts of lumps and pieces of material that were either hanging from structures, wedged against walls or made into massive piles. The scale was incredible. We worked very closely with Phyllida’s own team of technicians and fabricators, and it took about a year to create all the parts. During the install, trucks would depart her studio with the day’s materials at 6am, and we’d be waiting to receive them at the gallery. We’d have to carry everything up the fire escape because it was too big to fit in our lift, which is pretty vast as it is. It was quite spectacular when it was finished.

DALE WILSON For me, it would be the Olafur Eliasson exhibition at Tate Modern in 2019, because it was just so varied. It had everything from kaleidoscopic hanging sculptures and walls of reindeer moss to steam rooms and printer ink in trays with motors going through them. The main piece I remember was Your spiral view 2002. It’s a huge tunnel, made out of angular, jagged, modular aluminium panels that you have to put together in a concentric spiral formation. We did this with the artist’s own studio technicians, who were amazing people to work with, but you constantly had to be shouting at each other to say when you were ready to clamp something or put a rivet through it, otherwise it would just ping back and stab you in the face.

MZR How did you get into your roles?

RM You can arrive at a technician’s career from a lot of different directions. Like many, I started out as an art student and artist, but by the time I’d finished my degree, I realised I was more interested in making things generally. I did a lot of work in construction, electrics, plumbing and metalworking before coming back into the art world, and all of that has repaid me enormously in the role I have now. I’m a Senior Sculpture Conservation Technician at Tate Britain, which primarily means I’m responsible for making mounts and supports for art objects that are both discreet and secure.

LT I’m the Art Installation Manager, which involves timetabling and working out how to gather the materials and artworks to install a show. I had a similar route to Roger’s, but I think it’s interesting that, throughout my art education, these roles weren’t discussed. We would learn art history, but never how art might be fabricated, or how it gets onto the walls.

DW I had a slightly different experience in that I was at fart college after the gallery boom of the 1990s, so there was more of an industry waiting for my generation of students. I’m one of three Senior Technicians at Tate Britain. A technician’s job can vary a lot depending on whether you’re freelancing, working for a private gallery or a large institution. Some might have more of a custodial relationship with an institution’s collection, while others might be required to do more fabrication – knocking up plinths and other museum furniture, for example. But the common thread is that you’re there to facilitate the ideas of artists and curators, and to provide technical assistance and advice.

MZR The work of technicians is crucial to us artists, but it’s often less visible to audiences. What do you make of that?

RM Coming from a mount-making background, our work’s whole raison d’ être is to be invisible. I find working with artists a very satisfying part of my job and I don’t particularly worry about one aspect being visible and the other not – I see that as part of the role, and I really enjoy it.

LT I agree. These days, it’s much more common for the technical teams and all aspects of the production of an artist’s work to be credited – more like it is in the movie industry, maybe. But I don’t mind if I’m not. It’s really nice to facilitate someone’s vision and I feel it’s important that the work remains the artist’s creation.

DW What I find interesting is that often people have never even heard of our jobs. But that’s the case for a lot of people who work behind the scenes – like the transport agents, the conservators or the registrars. They all play their part as well.

MZR Do you have a favourite piece of equipment you always carry with you?

LT Something I associate with all art handlers at Tate is a Snap-on ratcheting screwdriver. I’ve got a bubblegum pink-handled one, which I acquired because my original one disappeared over a weekend. I asked if I could have a replacement – I didn’t care what colour it was, as long as it wasn’t black like everyone else’s. I was delighted with it.

DW One thing I put on my belt every day is a Leatherman Wave Plus, which has everything I need on it. I also recently bought a dump pouch meant for storing air gun ammo, which I put on my belt to hold screws, bolts and small tools, so I don’t have to carry a tool bag or rest objects on a ladder when I’m working at heights.

RM My apron – I made it myself, and it’s the culmination of having worn all kinds of work bags and belts over a fairly long career. It helps to create a professional impression, because I feel we have a responsibility to always have certain things on us – like a tape measure and pencils, a little engineer’s square and a short ruler. Having them in an apron also means it’s harder for people to borrow them!

MZR A few other technicians I’ve spoken to have said that they can’t not see the work of other technicians. Is that true for you too?

LT I think it’s all the little telltale signs you pick up on. When we’re installing, I just want to maintain the wall surfaces and the floor as best I can – down to making sure that when you’re drilling a hole in the wall, you’re not letting the plaster dust or wood swarf trail down it.

DW I suppose a mark of approval is just no sign that we were ever there… But often you wonder how something’s been hung, what fittings have been used – or, if it’s a heavy thing hanging from the ceiling, then what kind of rigging has been set up.

RM For me, it’s all about mounts. I spend all my time looking at mounts. Sometimes I don’t even see the objects. There’s a good online community of mount-makers, and there’s a great international mount-makers forum. It’s such an insane little world. I think we’re all the same when we go to exhibitions. We’re all looking at how everything’s been mounted – it’s really sad!

^{Art Now: Mohammed Z Rahman, until 8 November Mohammed Z Rahman is a British-Bengali artist based in London.}

^{Roger Murray is Senior Sculpture Conservation Technician at Tate Britain.}

^{Liam Tebbs is Art Installation Manager at Tate Britain.}

^{Dale Wilson is Senior Technician at Tate Britain.}

^{Supported by Bukhman Foundation. With additional support from the Art Now Supporters Circle and Tate Americas Foundation.}