The Collection · Object 003
The Riveted Plate
Cut from a working structure during repair, kept because the men who removed it could not bring themselves to melt it down.
Wrought iron · The Steel Crossing
The record
It came away during a repair, one plate among several, and the crew set it aside rather than send it with the rest. Nobody gave the order. It simply ended up leaning against a wall and then, later, indoors.
The rivets were driven by hand, which is legible in the spacing: close to regular, never quite. Four coats of paint sit on top of one another, each a slightly different shade of the same municipal intention.
It is heavier than anyone expects and does nothing at all. That is rather the point of it.
The making
- Maker
- A foundry that no longer exists
- Materials
- Wrought iron, hand-driven rivets, original paint