David O’Mara is reminiscing about the job that started it all. “A family friend knew someone who had a painting company and they said, ‘Oh, you’ve been to art college, you’ll be all right!’” He laughs. “But I hadn’t touched a paintbrush in years. I was into conceptual art.”
It was 2001 and O’Mara had just moved from Ireland to London with his girlfriend; he’d never envisaged working on a building site but he needed the work and soon found he could pick up the skills. He also realised the money was good, much better than in the arts. “I looked into working in a gallery, but those jobs are hard to find and often they don’t want to pay you,” he says. “It’s insane. A lot of the time, you need a lot of cultural capital even to be considered.”
