Plasterer Of Pisa
Sydney Morning Herald
Thursday November 2, 2006
Small creative jobs are the most satisfying for this decorative professional.When 10-year-old Tom Pisano arrived on a ship from Italy in 1955, he thought Sydney was just the buildings around the harbour. He looked out at Kirribilli and asked his mother where she thought they would be living. Hours later they arrived at their future home in Green Valley. "It was like outback Australia back then," Pisano says.
Life was tough, but tempered by family and community. Pisano recalls how children went to school barefoot and there were so many of his fellow countrymen, Italian was the dominant language. "Instead of us learning English, the kids started to learn Italian." At age 13, Pisano left school to help his father, who was working alone to support the family. He worked 16 hours a day for a greengrocer. Lucky for him, his father had teamed up with a colleague, and the pair were working with a new product called Gyprock. By 1961, they were so busy they asked the teenager to join them."Once I started Gyprocking, I thought 'This is not work. This is like going to a picnic.' We'd start at 8.30 and have a tea break at 10 and by 3.30 we'd be washing up."After a year, he and his father set up business on their own, specialising in setting (plastering the joints between sheets of Gyprock so they can't be seen when painted), and in the 1970s they graduated into commercial work. Eventually, the volume of work took a physical toll. "There came a time when my arm would go numb. So I said no. I have got to get out of doing repetitive work."Still working 45 years later, Pisano now does little renovation jobs, often run by owner-builders who book him months in advance. "I like working on smaller jobs. You meet people, and it gives you satisfaction when they say you did a good job."Pisano has another string to his bow. He now specialises in restoration of decorated plaster ceilings. "I love doing what I have to, to make a rose or flower when someone has put their foot through [a ceiling]."In comparison to the Gyprocking joints he's done in his lifetime - he says if laid end to end they'd reach all the way to Italy and back - Pisano considers restoration work more creative. "It is my ancestors' genes coming out. My ancestors were originally from Pisa. That is my surname, Pisano."He pulls out his business card which sports a drawing of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. "When I show my card, a lot of people say, ' I hope my walls are going to be straighter than this!' " he jokes.
© 2006 Sydney Morning Herald