This painting, by the Clydebank artist Tom Mckendrick, is directly related to his shipbuilding experiences as a worker in the former John Browns shipbuilding yard.

A highly textured painting it gives the viewer an unusual perception of a now dead trade… 'riveting.'

"Riveting was a dirty ansd dangerous job and the individuals who engaged in the trade were legendary on Clydeside. To earn a living riveters had to work in closely co-ordinated teams known as 'squads'. Each squad functioned as a fiercely independent unit whose earnings were directly related to their ability to work as a team".

"Riveters symbolised the eternal struggle for existence amongst the working classes of their day. Working conditions were brutal. No work no pay was the rule !….in all weather ...in exposed and cramped working conditions…with variable pay rates and no security of employment. Riveters had no options but to work long and hard... as long as work was available."

"I spent six years in the shipyard and have first hand experience of that industrial environment. A long time to look at the colours of heat on metal…hammered iron…ash, grime and the calligraph of the shipbuilder. This painting is not a sweet clean image, it is a compiled statement ...rough, burned, scraped and scarred, it is a brutal and uncompromising image ".

"With more than a little shipyard humour, I have painted an image of the Rivet God as an absurdly gigantic rivet. His head is misshapen and battered, red and burned…. He has seen a bit of action and has experienced life as a lowly rivet. As a consequence he can command the respect of the tradesmen that he represents". 1

"The rivet god is marked by the calligraphy of the `timekeeper'. Each timekeeper had his own set of marks, used to count the number of rivets hammered home and consequently calculate the rates of pay." 2

"Supported on both sides by two `butt straps'… pieces of metal plate that were used to join seams and strengthen areas of a ships structure…he is surrounded by the filth and grime of his trade. The working conditions of the shipbuilding environment were such that riveters were known as the black squad." 3

"The Rivet God has a single eye through which he views the world…reference to the fact that a riveted ship had millions of holes bored in it…and through any one at any time you could be spied upon by the foreman… " 4

"As a mark of respect; at the feet of theRivet God is an abstracted view of a welders helmet..not black as in the real world but white in fear and appeasement. The welder was seen as a great threat to the riveter and eventually brought an end to the trade." 5

"This painting is an intimate view of the surfaces of the ship and the hardships that were endured in the building process. It does not show the final graceful finished form that is familiar and we expect to see in a subject of this nature.I have peeled away the superficial layers to let us see beneath the surface and give an insight into the tough existence that was part of a riveter's life."