Watercolour and colour pencil study of Blast Furnace 4 at Port Talbot, the second to be turned off last year, marking the end of traditional steelmaking at the site.  Tata Steel UK allowed me access to the site for two days in October to interview some of the employees there, and to make portrait sketches as well as audio recordings to try to capture some of the memories and experiences in their own words and voices.  It was almost a month after the no.4 furnace was switched off, but the steam from the gradual cooling process was still clearly visible.  Here I have used a segment of audio from my interview with Wade Christensen, who had worked at the site since 2000, and was the Iron and Burdening Shift Manager. 

I interviewed Wade Christensen in October last year as part of a project to document some of the experiences of those working for TATA Steel at Port Talbot. The audio used below is taken from an interview I did with Wade when I visited blast furnace number four, the final furnace to be permanently shut down at the site, which had happened only a couple of weeks before I visited.  Before the two blast furnaces at Port Talbot were turned off, Wade had been managing a team of over fifty at furnace number four, but when I met him, he was managing a shift team of just seven.  There was a tangible sense of something missing from everyone's normal day to day experience at the site, particularly the lack of noise, activity, busyness and the people that would normally be there working. 

In the interview, Wade talked about the changes that had taken place in the industry during his career, and talked about the sense of loss felt by the community at the closure of the blast furnaces at Port Talbot, and with them the ability to produce virgin steel. 

This image is composed from two separate photographs.  Wade would never be anywhere near the furnace in a t-shirt and without his protective clothing, so the final image I have created is the result of a little bit of artistic license on my part, depicting him in the space where he would normally work, but without the protective clothing that he would normally be wearing.  

Wade was one of sixteen employees of TATA Steel that I met back in October.  I am creating portraits and studies of each sitter and aim to exhibit the works together with the accompanying audio interviews.

I recently completed a large watercolour depicting seven steel workers at Port Talbot, made from images taken during their final shift before October last year, when renovations began on the steel production area of the site, and the work started on building the new electric arc furnace there. I spoke to one of the steel workers in this group, Kriss (standing second in from the right of the image), who has worked at Port Talbot for over twenty years, and the audio is taken from this interview. This painting is part of a bigger project I started last October, when I began portraits of sixteen workers at Port Talbot, each accompanied by an audio interview to try and record some of the experiences of those working at the steel works.

Here is a selection of the preparatory drawings I started at Port Talbot Steelworks in October last year.  These drawings began as quick sketches made from life, each taking between 5 and 15 minutes, and were then worked back into using the photographs that I took as reference.  They are working drawings and not intended to be finished portraits in themselves, but are a useful starting point for me to begin the final paintings.  They are a really important part of the whole process for me, as they allow for time to get to know the face of the subject.    

I was able to spend two days at the Steelworks in Port Talbot back in October last year, when Tata Steel UK allowed me onsite to begin a project to create a series of portraits of steel workers there.  I met sixteen employees who represented the wide range of different roles and expertise of those working at the steelworks.  I made some quick sketches with the sitters which I continued to work into following my visit to use as my preparatory drawings for the final portraits.  I also made audio interviews with each sitter to accompany the paintings.  I spent the first day at the steel production side of the site, and the second over at the two blast furnaces, which were in the process of being decommissioned when I visited, having already "gone cold" (or almost - one was still smoking after almost a month!). 

It was an inspiring experience for me to meet some of the people that work at Port Talbot, and I was grateful that Tata Steel UK gave me the opportunity to visit the site, which I had been fascinated by since being a small kid, always looking out the window of the car as my parents drove along the M4 on the way to see my grandparents in nearby Gorseinon.   

I met Lloyd a few years ago and have been lucky enough to spend some time recording audio interviews and making some paintings and drawings in his workshop, where his radiator-repair business has been based now for over forty years.  At the age of eighty-five, Lloyd is still working and bringing his knowledge, experience and skill to repairing car radiators, usually concluding his working day at 3pm.  I've been working on a series of portrait studies of Lloyd and aim to bring the paintings and drawings together to be accompanied by some of the audio recordings.  Lloyd is a real inspiration, with such an eventful and long working life; he has so many brilliant stories and memories to tell.

Below is a short clip of Lloyd speaking about how a chance occurrence that happened on a building site he was working on in London in the 1960s turned out to be a fortuitous change of fortune, giving him an opportunity to demonstrate his skill with welding - one of the trades he had learnt growing up in Jamaica.

Below are a few of the drawings and paintings I have made of Lloyd (one painting also includes Julie, Lloyd's wife, who works with him in the workshop).  The drawing is made with pastel pencil and the two paintings are watercolour and colour pencil.

Before Vic retired I interviewed him about his long working life as a carpenter.  Here is a very short clip from the audio interview I made with Vic, talking about his workmates.  At some point I would like to present more of the interview I made with him as a piece of social documentary to accompany the drawings and paintings I made of him.