Work Placement Day 4: "Paint It Black."

Working Hours: 10:30am - 6:00pm
I wonder if the Rolling Stones would have written this song, so enthusiastically condoning a monochromatic transformation, if they'd ever actually HAD to paint everything black. Given my experiences today, my guess is no....
Today Natalie and I spent the day painting the set for 'How To Disappear Completely and Never be Found". It's taking place in the studio theatre and it's a very interesting set design- I can't wait to see it in action- it's sort of reminiscent of a mix of skyscrapers and computer chips.
The set consists of the following structure at each end of the theatre:

Each of the two structures consists of hundreds of holes on every surface, internal, external, north, south, east, west....

Our main job today was to paint the inside surface of every visible hole.... which is more time-consuming than it sounds as the drill holes are rough and uneven, meaning the paint didn't go on without a fight.
Here is a photo of Natalie beautifully demonstrating our role:

We also had to paint the floor:

It was hard work.

Tomorrow we are in bright and early to masking tape lines onto everything and to glaze all the surfaces. One of the main things I learnt today was the difficulty with requiring a matte set piece in theatre. Because the designer (who I met for the first time today, and was lovely) wanted to keep the black boxes matte, however jut keeping it as black emulsion would attract very visible marks and dust (one of the most annoying parts of our job today) and yet all the glazes are too glossy. Even the ones that claim to be 'matte glaze' are too shiny. Which isn't too surprising as 'matte glaze' is a bit of an oxymoron. I will be interested to see tomorrow how this problem is resolved.
On the bright-side, I also met the designer for '13' who on seeing my 'test painting' said she was happy for me to go ahead and paint the large one, which I hope to do next Tuesday. What's even better is that not only will I be allowed to use oils, but I will also be working on canvas, which hopefully means I will do a much better job! Hooray! Can't wait.
As a reward for our long day of hard graft, Natalie and I treated ourselves to tickets to see 'The Lion King'. It was a first time for both of us, and despite high expectations we were both utterly blown away. The opening sequence was just incredible. Such innovative costume. It's amazing that Disney can make 'Hamlet' so involving and emotional. And a good production to see for my POP essay, as all the technology used was visible to the audience. If anyone ever undermines the role of a costume designer ever again, I will ensure to bring-up the Lion King- a production that would be nowhere without the design and craft.