Love Story

A love story. With pictures.

The most exciting stories are the ones you are in. (sorry, you're probably not in this one...)

When I was about 19 or so, I went to some gathering at a friends house.

I first saw Alice sitting on a couch between some friends. I thought she was very beautiful. The vision shines on my mind.

Later on she actually spoke to me , and said " I like your shoes" refering to my Birkenstocks,

(Birkenstocks? What kind of love story begins with Birkenstocks!? I know, I know, but don't worry, it gets better.)

"... arent they the same as Richard Ashcroft's, you know on the cover of Urban Hymns?"

I said "nah, those are different ... similar though, moccasin toe..,"

and that was that. I congratulated myself on the really smooth death of a conversation.

I didnt see her for a year or so, except maybe fleetingly, swanning around with beautiful friends. Way out of my league.

Then we met again at some do. She was an art history major, ( major crush developing on my part) and we talked about Serra and his dangerous and imposing sculptures.

Then she moved to a regional town, and so I never saw her.

End of story.

or is it?..

Years pass...other misadventures in Love ripped my heart open, like Homer Simpson walking through a shoji screen, and then back through it again. ( a perfect, unpoetic analogy)

Someone-or-other casually said to me "oh, Alice is moving to Sydney..."

The very sound of the name 'Alice' was (and still is) synonymous with knuckle-biting desire.

clearly not me

Then and there I decided I would sally forth to Sydney, find her and win her heart.

In spite of my willingness to do so, I never had too. She came back to Melbourne- and when I met up with her by chance (or conspiracy?) that very week at a dinner party- something clicked!

She invited me to a Ryan Adams concert, emphasising the 'R'.

I said "Oh, yeah... ( in my head YES!!) ...who's that?"

"well, he sings country, but it's good."

country? well, I reasoned that I liked Neil Young and Dylan's Self Portrait album, so I guessed I was half way to liking country?

hmm, just thinking about it, so it was Alice who asked me out first. huh.

I picked her up in my old car who I called Emily. (Emily was a '64 EH Holden wagon- not hotted up, totally stock, sweet as. Shucks, I'm tearing up just thinking about it.)

The concert was actually really great. Ryan played well. As usual, some heckler requested Summer of 69, and Ryan stopped playing and asked him to leave. Angry fans booed him out of the building. It was a very entertaining evening, and really romantic too. I stood close to Alice and to be honest, felt a bit scared inside, I think I knew that this was going to be Love love, you know, and I had no idea what that was going to be like.(awww.... ha! well I told you it was a love story)

After that night we did a lot of cruising around in Emily, and general neglecting of all our friends. I dont have much to show for my time really- except that I know Ive spent a lot of it with Alice, which makes me happy.

Eventually I asked Alice to marry me and she said yes!

( and she was a stunning bride.................! ..........! !! ! ¡¡¡¡ those cheek bones- Zut ¡! ! )

actually even this pic didnt make it into the album- nice reject!

Soon enough little Esmé came along, then little Joseph, and we are well and truly The Neale Family.

That brings us up to today!

Happy 6th Anniversary, my beautiful Alice. In love with you!- David

back soon

Dear readers- especially the regulääs, ( you're great, by the way- did I tell you that?)

I wont post for a couple of days OK?

Well, I have to focus on getting my stuff finished for my exhibition. I mean it's 1 am right now... crumbs! Ill be back- with visual snacks, you'll see...

Tweed Rye Light Kombi & Honey

Tweed jacket I've salvaged for a Wall Pocket. Put stuff in there; coins, an old tissue, a boiled lollie, a train ticket, a hair comb, a pen knife?

Latest bronze badge. Me and my Rye obsession... I even wanted to call our son Rye, but was told I had to settle for that as a middle name...

( "because- it would sound like 'Ryan Eel'" was Alice's rationale)

Like a dinosaur egg...

Cut Away Kombi. I guess its a kid's thing that has turned into goldsmith's thing- to like small objects (and to want to shrink down to a tiny man and drive around in this thing, camping out under the bentwood chairs...)

Dad's funny label for his honey. ( This is an old one that the silverfish have enjoyed!)

Lately he's been giving us more honey than we can possibly eat. Really good full-bodied Yellow Box (a prevalent eucalyptus species here)- not heat treated or filtered.(bees knees float to the top) More on beekeeping to come...

Orange

Golden Fruit- A.A. Milne (from Not That It Matters Essays)

"It is well that the commonest fruit should be also the best. Of

the virtues of the orange I have not room fully to speak. It has

properties of health-giving, as that it cures influenza and

establishes the complexion. It is clean, for whoever handles it

on its way to your table but handles its outer covering, its top

coat, which is left in the hall. It is round, and forms an

excellent substitute with the young for a cricket ball. The pips

can be flicked at your enemies, and quite a small piece of peel

makes a slide for an old gentleman.

But all this would count nothing had not the orange such

delightful qualities of taste. I dare not let myself go upon this

subject. I am a slave to its sweetness. I grudge every marriage

in that it means a fresh supply of orange blossom, the promise of

so much golden fruit cut short. However, the world must go on.

Yet with the orange we do live year in and year out. That speaks

well for the orange. The fact is that there is an honesty about

the orange which appeals to all of us. If it is going to be bad--

for even the best of us are bad sometimes --it begins to be bad

from the outside, not from the inside. How many a pear which

presents a blooming face to the world is rotten at the core. How

many an innocent-looking apple is harbouring a worm in the bud.

But the orange has no secret faults. Its outside is a mirror of

its inside, and if you are quick you can tell the shopman so

before he slips it into the bag."

Otzi the ice man

For the outdoorsmen; check Otzi the Iceman's accoutrements... rugged. Aint no Black Diamond and Petzl!

Various reconstructions.

Stuff

H. Pyle. Marooned.

left with some water and a musket on a tidal sand bar...

Me, age 13 , by my sister , Kim. Not a bad likeness- reminds me of my little boy Joseph.

( although he is certainly handsomer)

Bon Papa at Queenscliff- note observational paintings of passing ships on the walls.

(This is at the heads of a large bay)

cushion at my Geepees.

Scrimshaw ( should I say scrimshandered?) whale tooth. Dunedin museum. Nice waves.

(And if I had teeth like that I would definately eat giant squid. Yum. Imagine calamari from a giant squid... you could make wheels out of it...)

A scrimshaw I did ages ago. About actual size. On bone. Did it with a pin. The hands are kind of weird. Its pretty tricky, because you cant really see what you've drawn until you ink it- and yet you must use firm, decisive scratches. Still, I thought you might find it interesting...

Up To

What I've been up to.

I will be having a solo exhibition at the JamFactory in Adelaide: April 10th-16th May.

Part of the group will be these foldy-leafy brooches... but also some quite different work.

More to come...

Schmertz!

Australian Schatzkammer sans moi! ...looks like I need my lion today

FineTool Journal

Red boxes vignette - I love these all the more for being tools that I use daily; pin vice, calipers, square ( well maybe I dont use the square so much!)

FTJ link

sorry Ive been away...

Morris Louis- nice edge...
Some of my twin boxes

Shaker sconce, just so. Really great.

Doves -Barbera Hepworth
Hepworth's studio- an early one

Ivon Hitchins
P.Go ( I guess Im into these muddy palettes...)
Pablo- I guess its not a wedding ring...

Louisa Calder with unjoined wedding ring by Sandy (who else)

he he! forgive my iconoclasticsm...

Comic

Donald Duck taught me a lot about treasure and stuff. In this story the ducks meet the fabled Gilded Man, a giant who wears a 24k gold body suit. It turns out he's bored with the locally ubiquitous gold and so desperately covets Donald's silver-buckled satchel. Funnily the color-in guy messed up the cover and made the buckles yellow.

+ geometric face-off.

Scars On Land

Well, its been quite an eventful week for me in terms of goldsmithing...

Ill tell you about soon- things are really changing for me.

Anyway, here's the Kings of Convenience doing a really beautiful new song. Love it. Got it on vinyl, spin it on my Thorens and fly afar.

Laughing Waters

The Gordon Ford house in Eltham- known as Laughing Waters. The government buys all the houses along the Yarra River when they come on the market- and many of them lie derelict.

This one is now an artist's residence run by the council. (where i got these pics)

It is a classic mudbrick ( we dont generally call them adobe over here) with hefty adzed timbers, and a cool mezzanine with a trapdoor.

For a long time it lay derelict, then fellow jeweller / artist Vicky Shukuroglou ( I just call her 'Shook') kind of just moved in and started fixing up the broken hinges etc.

When she went on a jaunt to Europe, she asked me to look after her 'squat'. I said ye-hes! She had some kind of de facto caretaker status with the council, so it was semi-official I guess.

It was a bit spooky, to be true. Random strangers would cut through the property all the time.

So I just shut myself up in the mezzanine at night. In the morning I would collect all the little black scorpions off the floor and watch them fight in the jar. I managed to make a few objects in my time there, but mostly I was just chooglin' like an Eltham hippy.