As long as Phil and Anne were going to be centre of attention attracting hordes of passersby with their Sub-Aqua Regality, I though I’d have a bit of a wander around to rebuild my crushed ego, my spirits low as German tourists nudged me with their ample backsides to get me out of the way to get closer to King Phil Neptune. Mermaid Anne lured men with a smile and a flick of her luscious sea-locks, and the last thing they then wanted was to talk to a red-faced fella with a ginger-beard. The market was a hub of activity and liveliness so I headed off to see who I could meet.
Feeling hunger pangs is something we’ve all three gotten used to, so my first though was to try to find someone who might be willing to feed us. However, it was a busy day, as I said, and our situation requires a little explaining sometimes, and I figured it wouldn’t be appreciated to hold up a line of hungry, paying patrons while I asked the owner to help us. So, with a sullen sigh I resolved to wait a while, and let things calm down, and to enjoy the market atmosphere; the smells, the aromas, the scents, the colours, the eclectica on offer, an the assortment of different people, and let it all sink in. So, with my head full of images of pie floaters, I walked past a tentl facing the beach, where a caricaturist was drawing a portrait.
Thinking it would be a good idea to get ours done I approached the rather dapper guy once he’d finished his last one and asked him if he would be interested in drawing our caricatures. Of course, he said, he’d be there until the market closed, and to come by whenever we were done. I shook his hand and we had ourselves a plan.
Telling the King Pectoralis and Fishy Annie the news and they just about condescended to grant me permission to talk to them for long enough to tell them the plan. “Now hasten from view”, they said as I slinked off into the shadows once more. So, tiring of the forced grin I was wearing to stave away the forlorn defeat of uselessness, I went to Adriaan’s tent to watch him draw for a while, to see what we were in for. Inside was Denise, Adriaan’s wife, and we got to talking about the book she’d published herself, called ‘Where Rainbows Live’.
A remarkable book, it in that in its original form it is all quilted, that is, the illustrations and the text were hand sown into a patchwork of quilting, with each page done this way, individually and painstakingly. The book is the paper format of the quilted original, and it loses none of its lustre for being so. I was warming to these people. Especially when she told me that as no publishers had been interested in such a niche, specialised, market, she decided to go it alone and publish herself. Adriaan, she was telling me, is, primarily, a sculptor, specialising in marble, stone, wood and metal.
Things got even more interesting when I found out these good people were the Vanderlugt’s, neighbours of Cate’s in Strathdickie, neighbours of ours for the next couple of days, and so we were invited to come and visit them, to see the sculptures up close and to have a look at some of Denise’s quilted work. As Adriaan drew away I sat there and an arrangement was made for the following day. Anne and Phil dried off in the mortal world of man, posing for Adriaan too, Anne’s regal stature coming across in the portrait.
So, at the end of the day, we helped the Vanderlugt’s pack their stuff away into their car, thanking Adriaan again for the portraits and we agreed to meet the following day. Arriving at their place shortly before lunch, having been digging a storm trench for Cate around her house all morning, we got there up a series of winding stone steps, all laid without mortar, that meandered through the scrub, from the dirt road below, curling its way up through the dense bushland emerging up and onto the Vanderlugt’s property. He had suggested we arrive there that way, and we realised why. Adriaan spent a year building this path, and it was the perfect way to arrive at their home, which had even more to impress us.
Welcoming us warmly he then showed us round as Denise prepared tea and coffee for us. He showed us his sculptures, firstly one called Driving a Dry Well, which was made of recycled farm equipment, an old windmill pump with a propeller, made in the form of a vehicle, that Adriaan assured us “you can take a few friends with you, and go any where you like, at any speed you wish”. There was a five foot long hand carved limestone nudibrance, a tiny slug-like gastropod that grazes the bottom of reefs, that lazed impressively, looking like it was paused mid movement. Another large piece called Soldier Crab sat further up the garden, made of aluminium and recycled copper, and part of his ‘Pun Intended’ series of 1996, it sports an imposing rifle, it’s carapace shaped like a soldiers helmet.
Various busts lined the perimeters, mostly animals and creatures, which form a strong theme in his work. One work in progress, a marble carving of three pelicans, was once a six tonne slab of marble, which for the past twenty years he has been working on, and is arriving at the final stage of polishing. Working in wood he has carved humpback whales diving (Breeching Humpback) out of White Beech, as well as Rocking Kangaroos, which he used to make to order, out of Hoop Pine. There is a large xylophone shaped like fish scales, made of metal, tuned to perfection that Phil banged out a rendition of Waltzing Matilda on, that Adriaan also made.
In his workshop were various trunks of wood “waiting for the right project”, hand-carved oars, various projects began, discarded and turned to something else, slabs of marble “too funny looking to work with, but too precious to get rid of”, and remnants of his previous lives and work, where he told us of his childhood in Canada, after being born in Holland, finally emigrating to Australia thirty years ago after travelling briefly.
Statuettes, sculptures, and figurines abound in and around the Vanderlugt’s home. Inspired by the reef, the rainforest, the wetlands and the sky he has explored these interests for over thirty years, and continues to do so. Developing his passion from his early working with soapstone, a medium inspired by the soapstone sculptures of the Inuit of Canada, where he grew up, he has found a home in Australia, and for over thirty years has lived here.
“With simple tools, I began to carve soapstone, some marble, and even bone. Carving became a passion, but my career in graphic design was demanding much of my energy and my dream of full time sculpting had gone adrift. Memories of travel in Queensland were magnetic and in 1977, I returned to Australia with my Australian wife Denise, and anchored that dream in the magic of the Whitsunday region. Here, in an environment of animals, birds, rainforest and reef, I have a constant source of inspiration”
www.vanderlugt.com.au
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