One of my first jobs in New Zealand was with the railways, as 'relay mechanic'. My English was still rather shaky and my off-sider came from the top of Scotland! At that time I still wrote in Dutch and had stories accepted in Holland and Belgium. Soon I was offered a position at the Canterbury Museum, to make small diorama displays - mainly for country schools - and some years later I found myself creating the very large dioramas in the Auckland Museum.
Karen and I played early and ethnic music on stage, on radio and TV.
I played saxophone in a jazz band, and later flute in a Greek orchestra.
I exhibited sculptures in leading art galleries in Holland, Australia and New Zealand. In between I participated in stage productions at the Mercury and the New Independent Theatres in Auckland, both on stage and as musical director/musician. My first solo exhibition didn't happen. Everything was carefully planned, the invitations were printed, and the director of the Stedelijk Muzeum had promised to do the official opening. The Stedelijk Muzeum is the most prestigious modern art museum in Amsterdam, and it would make my exhibition more important in the eyes of the public. I had delivered my portfolio in the evening, but when I arrived the next morning to help the gallery owner hang the exhibition, I found the police examining the front door. Overnight there had been a burglary and my entire collection of work had been stolen. My first solo exhibition!
I got restless, decided to build a 54 foot yacht, so my wife Karen and I could go back to the sea. It took 7 years of weekends and holidays, financed by writing, performing and directing on stage, playing music, sculpting, and - in what little spare time we could find - building unusual musical instruments.
We lived on board, getting ready to travel overseas. Then a bombshell: the asbestos in my lungs - legacy of my work at the Auckland War Memorial Museum! - began to play up, no more ocean sailing after all. My response: to write a cheerful novel, SAIL THEATRE, SAIL, followed by several stage plays and musicals, five of which have been produced, and the novel CLONE.
During that entire period, from my student days till the present, I never stopped sculpting and painting. Most of my more important work is now in collections in America, in Australia and in Europe.
After 16 years aboard, often in Whangarei, Karen and I lived for another 10 years on top of a hill on tiny Kawau Island, where there are no shops, no roads, no rubbish removal or any other services apart from electricity - most of the time - and telephone, and where we got our mail delivered by the Royal Mail Run ferry twice a week.
During that entire period, from my student days till the present, I never stopped sculpting and painting. Most of my more important work is now in collections in America, in Australia and in Europe.
And now, several exhibitions and 7 literary awards and prizes later, we have moved to a house (!) in Whangarei, not far from where Linda and Jenny would have lived, if they had been real people instead of imaginary friends of mine, living in my novel CLONE.
The important thing is we never give up: after all those years Karen and I still play our music for whoever engages us.
Leo Cappèl
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