“I was both proud and a little nervous when I was asked to put together a show to mark Tate Liverpool’s 30th birthday and my three-decade career here as an art handler.
As a technician, I am drawn to the hands-on construction of things and one of my first choices was Phillip King’s Within, a huge sculpture that is complex to assemble.
From that point, the size and concept of the show evolved as I began to realise that my favourite works by the likes of Graham Sutherland, JMW Turner, Barbara Hepworth, Mark Rothko and Andy Goldsworthy all explored the unseen parts of our world such as space, emotions, light and colour.
I’ve always had an interest in art. When I left school in Scunthorpe in the late 1960s, I went to work in the local steel works and studied art at college in the evenings. After three years, I did the typical young hippy thing of the time and went to explore London.
I was working in a restaurant when I saw an advert for a job as a junior technician at Tate and I started there in 1972, finding myself in the right place at the right time, as the art world was undergoing huge change.
One of my first jobs was to help with the installation of Carl Andre’s 1966 work Equivalent VIII, the infamous bricks that caused a scandal. It was a challenging piece and I’m not sure I grasped its meaning or the intentions of minimalism at the time.
It was the shock of the new for me, just as it was for many who came to see it. Eventually, of course, one of the tabloids kicked off the whole rumpus about how much Tate paid for it, but I was learning about art through being part of the process.
My chosen highlight of this exhibition, the sculpture Within, is a huge work that I thoroughly enjoyed assembling. There are 40 or so elements made of elm, metal and slate, and they fit together in a pleasing curve shape; you feel encircled as King explores space and time all around you.
It comes with detailed instructions and even though this is the third time I have worked on it, you can never be completely certain about how it’s going to behave. The wood moves and changes shape while it’s in storage and there’s always the risk that it won’t bolt together properly.”
Ken Simons recently retired as the art handling manager at Tate Liverpool
Interview by John Holt. Ken’s Show: Exploring the Unseen is at Tate Liverpool until 17 June
As a technician, I am drawn to the hands-on construction of things and one of my first choices was Phillip King’s Within, a huge sculpture that is complex to assemble.
From that point, the size and concept of the show evolved as I began to realise that my favourite works by the likes of Graham Sutherland, JMW Turner, Barbara Hepworth, Mark Rothko and Andy Goldsworthy all explored the unseen parts of our world such as space, emotions, light and colour.
I’ve always had an interest in art. When I left school in Scunthorpe in the late 1960s, I went to work in the local steel works and studied art at college in the evenings. After three years, I did the typical young hippy thing of the time and went to explore London.
I was working in a restaurant when I saw an advert for a job as a junior technician at Tate and I started there in 1972, finding myself in the right place at the right time, as the art world was undergoing huge change.
One of my first jobs was to help with the installation of Carl Andre’s 1966 work Equivalent VIII, the infamous bricks that caused a scandal. It was a challenging piece and I’m not sure I grasped its meaning or the intentions of minimalism at the time.
It was the shock of the new for me, just as it was for many who came to see it. Eventually, of course, one of the tabloids kicked off the whole rumpus about how much Tate paid for it, but I was learning about art through being part of the process.
My chosen highlight of this exhibition, the sculpture Within, is a huge work that I thoroughly enjoyed assembling. There are 40 or so elements made of elm, metal and slate, and they fit together in a pleasing curve shape; you feel encircled as King explores space and time all around you.
It comes with detailed instructions and even though this is the third time I have worked on it, you can never be completely certain about how it’s going to behave. The wood moves and changes shape while it’s in storage and there’s always the risk that it won’t bolt together properly.”
Ken Simons recently retired as the art handling manager at Tate Liverpool
Interview by John Holt. Ken’s Show: Exploring the Unseen is at Tate Liverpool until 17 June
