It looks awful. It looks like fecal matter, something black and disgusting, an abomination – behold a true icon of Auckland life, the fibreglass sculpture of Dale the spider in the town square of Avondale, that long woebegone suburb not quite out west and not really central, either,
A home for good old Dale, the Avondale spider
The Avondale spider is going to be moved, but where to? Photo / Sylvie Whinray
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
Avondale is a suburb in transition. New housing is radicalising its appearance and its character; 1485 new homes will be completed in the next few years, with two large apartment blocks already in the middle of town, and Kāinga Ora right now building a massive 166-home development.
This activity has introduced a zest to the place, in contrast to the shopping centre, with its vape stores and dollar shops and laundromats. The best food in town is at Taste, a Vietnamese bakery thatwon the gold medal for a bacon and egg pie at last year’s Bakel pie awards. Sign on the front door of Taste last week: “Shop was burglar. Close today.”
Avondale struggles. It lies low on the isthmus with a view of the blue mountains of the Waitākeres. It has no maunga and the only water is the Whau River, out of sight behind the factories on the Rosebank peninsula. The heart of it used to be the Avondale racecourse, now a vacant lot, horseless, although it bursts into life when it hosts the famous Sunday markets, where thousands gather to buy cheap long-handled axes, bok choy, pink taro, enormous bras, ostrich eggs and other essentials. And then there is Avondale’s creature from a black lagoon, Dale.
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
The artwork was modelled on Huntsman spiders (Delena cancerides), now actually known as Avondale spiders – this year marks the 100th anniversary of its first identification in New Zealand, when the species somehow arrived from Australia and flourished in the Avondale lowlands. Household sightings were common for decades. A small population clings on in and around scrub at Olympic Park on the border of New Lynn. They were world-famous only in Avondale until they starred in the 1990 US horror film Arachnophobia. Auckland’s wittiest cinema, Hollywood in Avondale, screened the film last Halloween, and commissioned bug handler Brian Lawton to let loose live Huntsmans among the audience.
Spider artwork is part of the branding of Avondale Primary School. The spider sculpture itself has become a crucial part of Avondale’s identity. It was first placed on top of the Mobil service station, then moved to its current site in the town square in 2002. The primary school used to celebrate its birthday but Dale’s 21st went by last year in silence. Debate will be held throughout 2024 about what to do with the thing towards the end of the year when development is scheduled to begin on Avondale’s new community centre and library – exactly where Dale currently resides, in all its beat-up poo-ey pomp. Should it stay where it is, should it go somewhere else? Either way, it needs maintenance, and costs are quoted between $10,000 and $20,000. Who pays? Is it worth that much?
On assignment in Avondale last week, I was approached on the main street by Steven Lilo, 39, and asked if I was writing about Dale. He said he has lived at 10 different addresses in Avondale. “I honestly think it’s the best suburb in Auckland,” he said. His views on Dale? It has to stay, he said: “It is Avondale.”
Duncan Macdonald said, “I am Dale’s father.” The former chair of the Avondale Business Association – ousted in controversial circumstances, the controversy very much of his own making – rightly takes credit for placing the sculpture in the town square, and giving the suburb a popular, much-loved emblem. It used to squat on top of the Mobil roof until head office in Australia wanted it gone. Macdonald stepped in, and stored the spider underneath a tarpaulin in the basement of the Spider Bar; he then set about selling it to the Avondale Community Board to fund relocating it to the town square in 2002.
“The idea of Dale was to have an icon,” he said. “No different than the Ōhakune carrot. But it was one of the biggest, hardest sells I’ve ever done. There was one lady who voted totally against it. When we had a competition to name him, she got 28 negative votes for her name. But I won’t tell you who that was.”
“Please tell me who it was,” I said.
“Catherine,” he said.
He meant board member Catherine Farmer, who remains active in Avondale affairs on the Whau Local Board. I called her and told her that 28 Avondalians mooted naming the thing in her honour. “I did not know that,” she replied. “Thank you for telling me. That makes me feel quite pleased, actually. Quite chuffed.”
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
She sounded anything but chuffed. She hated the idea of a spider sculpture in the first place but reluctantly concedes that Dale has helped give Avondale an identity. It was a hard-fought concession and even then she doubled down on her original objection.
I asked, “When you look at the way it’s become part of the Avondale community and identity, do you think in retrospect your objection to Dale was wrong?”
“I don’t know if I can answer that question,” she said.
I said, “Well, you were trying to prevent what’s become this huge emblem of Avondale, maybe its most outstanding visual feature after the racecourse.”
“Well, you know, I guess you’re really accurate in that description. Yeah. Was I wrong? I don’t know if I can admit to that,” she said.
I asked, “Well, Avondale would be somewhat emptier without it, wouldn’t it?”
“Oh, I’m not sure about that. Duncan [Macdonald], being so mesmerised by it, he created a fantasy, I think, around its importance ... I think a lot of people who’ve moved into Avondale may not see it that way.”
She described Macdonald as her “nemesis”. They fought each other for nearly 30 years around the tables of Avondale bureaucracy – until Macdonald lost his position as chair of the business association to Marcus Amosa. He retaliated by attempting to ban Amosa from attending association meetings, held in an office upstairs from Macdonald’s business, Avondale Appliances. Amosa said, “I saw him a couple of years later walking down the street, and he told me to eff off.”
Central government has nothing on the tooth-and-claw bitterness of local body politics. Dale the spider sculpture has been caught in the middle of these personal dislikes and hostilities; Macdonald’s pet project was the despair of Catherine Farmer, and Marcus Amosa admits he initially viewed the thing as an unwanted legacy of Maconald’s years of service at the business association. Now, though, like Farmer, he has come to accept that people in Avondale like it, and want it. But does he want it?
He said, “I’ve spoken to a couple of community groups that are really passionate about it. I’m not. I’m not passionate. But I’ll support people in their endeavour.”
Really? As chair of the business association, which owns Dale, it’s up to Amosa to decide what to do with the thing. Concerned locals distrust he will look after it.
Lisa Truttman, as the long-serving editor of the Avondale Historical Journal, has an intimate knowledge of Dale’s history. I asked her, “Do you suspect that the business association are kind of actively wishing it would just go away?”
She replied, “Yes. And you can quote me on that. I don’t care if you quote me on that. I would say yes. I’m getting the very strong vibes on that, and I wish they would really put that to one side and actually put the community first.”
Jason Valentine-Burt plays an active role in trying to preserve Avondale’s heritage. I asked him, “Do you suspect that the business association want to get rid of it?”
He replied, “Yes. Yes, absolutely I do. My feeling is that they think the iconography of Dale and the spider theme has done its dash and doesn’t really fit with the new Avondale which is increasingly gentrified.”
He talked of his role in campaigns to save trees in Avondale. None of the campaigns were successful. He said, “I’m trying to think of a battle that has been won and I can’t think of one. It’s like, at the moment, development is winning.
“The key thing for me is as a suburb we are losing so much of our history. There’s very little left. We’re losing our history and at what point do we draw a line in the sand and say no we’re not prepared to keep losing our history, and actually say no, we want to have Dale restored and kept in a a prominent position.”
I put this lack of faith to Marcus Amosa. He attempted to soothe fears Dale would be stamped out, but he went about it in a very strange way.
Amosa has a propensity for making grand speeches which convey a beautiful vision for Avondale but lack a single piece of detail. He said, “I see Avondale in colour. And I see bright colours. I’m just kind of trying to describe, you know, I can’t actually see the detail, but it’s bright. And it’s colourful and it kind of flows, and it’s kind of connected and flowing. That’s kind of how I just visually see the centre of town. And I feel like the spider would be in the periphery, somewhere, you know, but not in the heart of Avondale.”
He pledged that it would have a future somewhere in Avondale. Several locations have been mooted on Avondale’s community Facebook page. One: a grassy knoll at Apex Park, the entrance to Avondale. But Amosa said, “I don’t think that’s suitable … I don’t think it will capture the vibes that I’m trying to see.” Two: stay exactly where it already is, in the middle of the town square. But Amosa said, “I see something else in the middle. I see something bright and colourful.” Three: the Hollywood Cinema. This is where things got … strange.
Amosa said, “I asked them, and they were not keen.”
Hollywood is owned and managed by brothers Matt and Ant Timpson. I asked Amosa, “Were you dealing with one of the Timpsons?”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“Which one?”
“Ant.”
I got in touch with Ant Timpson. “This is pretty funny,” he emailed. “I’ve never spoken to or even met Marcus Amosa.”
I got in touch with Billie Rogers, venue manager at the Hollywood. She said no one at the Avondale Business Association has ever contacted the cinema to ask if it would like to take the spider.
“But Amosa said he spoke with Ant,” I said.
“That’s strange,” she said.
Even stranger, though, were Amosa’s claims that the cinema was “not keen” to take the spider. In fact the Hollywood is very, very keen. Billlie Rogers: “We definitely want it.” Ant Timpson: “My brother Matt, who owns the Hollywood, loves Dale and the idea of him living out his days there.”
Jason Valentine-Burt talked about the “gentrification” of Avondale; Eke Panuku’s development of a community centre and library belongs to its mission of “urban regeneration”. These are tectonic shifts in Avondale, run-down but proud, 28 minutes on the train to downtown Britomart, its decile 4 primary school with a school roll mainly comprised of 22 per cent Māori, 16 per cent Pākehā, 17 per cent Samoan, and 10 per cent Indian. Dale the spider sculpture, that weird and inspired idea come to life, occupies an uncertain position in the new Avondale. The new homes, the new community centre – and an old, disintegrating spider, caught between past and future.
Nathan Savill restores sculptures for a living. He was asked by the business association for a quote to fix Dale. He came up with a price of $10,000. “Mate’s rates,” he said, based on his affection for Dale and his desire to see it remain in Avondale. He was later asked by Eke Panuku for a quote. He came up with $15,000: “They have a lot more funds behind them.” He also mentioned that he’d spoken with Marcus Amosa about crowdsourcing the cost, and came up with between $15,000 and $20,000 … He had doubled the price in a single interview, but in any case he was confident that despite Dale’s gross appearance, the thing was easily fixable.
“You just have to give it a damn good clean,” he said. He talked about mould inhibitors and fibreglass patches. “It’s not rocket science. It’s not an unattainable goal.”
But even mate’s rates scared off the Hollywood Cinema. Venue manager Billie Roger, when told of the lowest price, said, “Well, Hollywood’s not paying for that, that’s for sure.”
Amosa said the Avondale Business Association have an operating budget of $150,000. He was loathe to commit much of that to restoring the sculpture.
I asked him, “As the owner, you’ve got a responsibility to put a substantial amount towards it, do you not?”
He said, “I wouldn’t say substantial.”
“Would you say small?”
“Yeah.”
Eke Panuku are developing the land where Dale lives. “They have a responsibility to contribute towards the fixing up and the rehoming of Dale,” said Jason Valentine-Burt. I approached Richard Davison, location director for south and west at Eke Panuku.
“We’re just here to maybe put a little bit of money and human effort into working out what to do with it.”
I asked, “So there could be a financial commitment?”
He said, “There could be a small one.”
Davison added that he didn’t think it was “appropriate” for the sculpture to remain in the town square. Neither does Marcus Amoa, who is also against it going to Apex Park. His preference: “My personal view is that kids love it, so I would love to see it near a park of some sort, with a playground or skate park.”
This matches the description of Riversdale Park in Avondale. It has playing fields, a playground, a skate park. It’s also a long way out of the centre of town towards the end of a dead-end street. Jason Valentine-Burt is aghast that Dale might end up there.
But there is a worse fate, worse even than some obscure corner of good old Avondale, that suburb in flux, bordered by the Ding Dong Dairy and the Julie Ann Dairy, revitalised by new homes and new residents. Dale could just crawl off and die. “What I can see,” said Valentine-Burt, “is once Dale comes down to make way for the new community centre, and there are no concrete plans in place where he’s going to go, is that he could just quietly slide into the never-never.”
This story originally named Ockham as the landlord of two large apartment blocks in the centre of Avondale. This was incorrect.
