Look For Erle [on KS Friday]

Posted on March 29, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

erle cover copy

When you pull up Kerri’s page on iTunes you’ll notice that they have a hard time placing her music in a category. New Age? Easy listening? Classical? Country? One does not easily fit into the filing system until one can be clearly labeled. How can you be effortlessly labeled?

It’s a challenge all of us face. What’s the label? How do you fit? And (here’s the rub), it’s bad enough that the greater-world-filing-system needs a label to locate you, the real confusion comes in the labels we impose on ourselves. Are you a dentist? A liberal? A conservative? A mother? A foodie? Self-made, dependent, injured, Christian (which branch?), Muslim, agnostic, vegetarian, cowboy, rich, poor, retired, globalist, nationalist, capitalist, socialist? Do you “know?” Are you the righteous? Professor? How do you place yourself in the greater-world-filing system? Never mind how the “the system” attempts to squeeze you into a role, what’s the little box that you try to squeeze yourself into?

Is that who you are? Is that little box where you belong? Is it the totality of your being?

Sometimes I think we spend most of our lives dividing ourselves so that we might fit into a very small box. And, what we do to ourselves we most certainly do to others. They. Them. Not us.

Divide. Label. Locate.

Reduce. Contain. Shelve.

Although there is a certain amount of safety-feeling when living in a very small box, there is also very little vitality. Little things look big from the vantage point of a tiny box.  Little things look threatening from the confines of a too-tight label. Little boxes are petri dishes for big fear.

We bandy these words about and paste them on the walls of our too-little-boxes: mindfulness, wholeness, vitality. “This life is not a dress rehearsal.” “You are infinite potential.” “Today is day one.” Maya Angelou, Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa. Peace.

These ideals, all of them, wonder, magic, love, artistry, unity, harmony,…truth…crackle beyond the label. They are there – outside the box – and they are never found in the direction of division. They are always present if you care to put down the label-maker.

Get out of your box and turn around. Maybe spin around and around and lose your balance like you did when you were young and less needy of location. Look at the mystery that chases you and chase it. Play tag with this life. Remember how you laughed just because? Reach.

Kerri stood on the edge of a canyon and, although afraid of heights, she threw open her arms. Kirsten called me to tell me. “Mom’s on the edge,” she whispered into the phone. “I’m really proud of her.”

note: this composition has nothing to do with what I just ranted about except for maybe this: the only locators that really matter are the people who love you and show up for you. Your friends along the way. This is the label I am most attached to: Kerri and I are very rich in friends.

OLD FRIENDS REVISITED on the album RELEASED FROM THE HEART is available on iTunes & CDBaby

 

read Kerri’s blog post about ERLE

 

muddy boots blue website box copy

 

old friends revisited/released from the heart ©️ 1995 kerri sherwood

erle ©️ 2019 (and beyond) kerri sherwood

Filed under: Edges, KS Friday, Rants, Seeing, The Direction of Intention, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Re-Member [on DR Thursday]

Posted on March 28, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative
alki cropped copy

a morsel of ‘alki beach’

I was surprised. This was the first painting Horatio pulled from my stacks. It’s an older painting, a piece I’d forgotten.  “I like this one,” he said, and told me why.

Horatio is a great artist so it was a rare treat to rummage around the studio and talk about my work. I don’t often talk about it, not really. When showing paintings, people ask questions and I usually deflect the question back at them. It’s a rule. Artists often get in the way of the relationship between their painting and an observer. I want people to see what they see, not what I think they should see. There is no right answer or any one way of seeing a painting.  That’s the point; they have the power to re-create it for themselves. The magic is on the purity of the relationship. I’m more interested in their re-creation than I am in what I think they should see.

Horatio gave me a great gift. He helped me see ALKI BEACH anew. He helped me remember and in remembering I saw the painting again as if for the first time. It was like meeting an old friend after many years. Since Horatio’s visit I’ve had a chance to chat with ALKI BEACH over coffee. We reminisced about the day, the event that inspired it. I remember how the sun and air felt walking that day so long ago on Alki Beach. I remember sitting in my chair in my studio staring at a blank canvas. I remember the birds, the gulls and crows and eagles. I remember reaching for the charcoal.

I remember my surprise at what emerged on the canvas, the day I stepped back, paint on my face and hands, and saw ALKI BEACH for the first time. I remember thinking, “I like this one.”

 

 

read Kerri’s blog post about ALKI

 

rhode island website box copy

 

alki beach ©️ circa 2009, david robinson

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Learn. Grow. [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on March 27, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

we are all visitors copy 2

 

Today is a special day. After reading what Kerri wrote on this Not-So-Flawed Wednesday, I decided the best I could do is silence and point you to her words. Here’s a link to her thoughts on turning 60. Happy Birthday, my most beautiful wife.

kerricloseuparches copy

 

if you missed it above, read Kerri’s thoughts on VISITORS

 

closeup at jonathans website box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Love The Mud [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on March 26, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

maturity with background copy

“It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” ~ Picasso

It would seem to be a no-brainer. Mastery comes from a lifetime of doing. Trial and error. Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000 hours rule: success is nothing more than practicing the task for many hours over many years. As the old joke goes, it’s how you get to Carnegie Hall.

Efficiency. Ease. Body knowledge. Body of Knowledge. Flow. Wisdom. The blossoms of a long-body of experiences. The farmer, over a lifetime of living and working the same plot of land, knows the signs that no one else can see. They sense the storm coming. They smell the time for planting. They waste no time; their 10,000 hours having developed a solid relationship, a kinship with their environment and work.

An artist, over a lifetime of living and working the same plot of music or paint or dance, knows the signs that no one else can see. Artistry is efficiency, a single line saying more than 20. A musical phrase capable of reaching deeper into hearts than was once possible. Like the farmer, their 10,000 hours becomes 20,000 and then 30,000. Their worth, their work, after so many hours of hands in the soil or fingers on the keys, is incalculable.

Awash in abstractions, organizations play by a different set of understandings. Bottom lines are blind to mastery. You’d be amazed (or not) at how many people I know who’ve been “let go” because a younger, less expensive person, might “fill the role” and “cost less.” Mastery as deficit. You’d  be astounded (or not) at how many people I’ve coached who were punished because they became highly efficient. Their life-of-experience made their work look too easy. They were either squeezed for more or released as unnecessary.

What happens when all of the organizational knowledge, the ease and efficiency that comes via experience, becomes a liability? Wearing my consulting hat I’d routinely shake my head at the standard folly of leadership – people in power suits and ties a hundred miles from the dust and grit of the boots-on-the-ground – determining with pencil and paper the time and worth of a task. Abstracting the worth of a life. Budgetary efficiency driving the carefully calculated undervaluation of experience. Actual efficiency red-lined by abstract efficiency. As John would say, “Penny wise and pound foolish.”

Maturity in season of life. It comes from a job description that came across Kerri’s desk. Maturity as a job requirement! A search for someone with the experience necessary to paint like a child. Seeking the mastery that results from years and years of plowing the same fields.

I wonder if the hiring committee merely tossed out flowery language or actually understood that their ideal candidate would come through the door with boots made muddy from a lifetime of walking the fields?

 

read Kerri’s blog post about MATURITY IN SEASON OF LIFE

 

buffalo adirondack chair website box copy

 

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Seeing, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Consider Context [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 25, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

civility 2 copy

It’s an idiom. A turn of phrase. When push comes to shove. The moment when a decision must be made. Look it up and you’ll read that the expression carries a connotation of escalation. Shoving is more aggressive than pushing.

A moment of decision. On the threshold of escalation.

Like all idioms (or all words, for that matter) context is everything. We saw this phrase on a billboard. It is a campaign promoting civility at a time when civility seems in short supply. We liked it and thought it would be a good quote for Merely-A-Thought-Monday. Context: Civility.

Google the phrase and you’ll discover the disease that plagues us. Namely, the lack of capacity to consider context. Or, perhaps, no capacity to recognize context. Or, perhaps, no capacity to consider a context that differs from one’s own. The top of your Google search will reveal a rage of opposition to the billboard promoting civility.  Shove harder. “…so basically they’re telling you let the son of a b$&@? push you around…”

Wow. It’s an idiom. Context: Civility.

To be fair, a scroll down the Google chain includes motivational stories, a dance piece by Twyla Tharp, more links to PassItOn.com images and tv spots, a song by The Grateful Dead, a lyric by Rascal Flatts. A festival of differing contexts and usages of this phrase when push comes to shove.

Here are a few other idioms: where the rubber meets the road. When the going gets tough, the tough get going. When the chips are down…, When the dust settles…, When in Rome…

A moment of decision. On the threshold of escalation. Context matters.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about CIVILITY

 

shadow des plaines river trailwebsite box copy

Filed under: Education, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Reflect On It [on KS Friday]

Posted on March 22, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative
her palette - the piano copy

I so loved Kerri’s post yesterday that, today, I’m reflecting it back to her.

Do we ever really know what it takes to do someone else’s job? We don’t know the tools used, the research done, the years of training and experience, how someone perceives their own work. We can only guess and, most often, fall desperately, arrogantly, audaciously off the mark.

Kerri’s piano dominates her studio. A black 6’7″ Yamaha grand. It is not a show piece, it is a workhorse. Littering the music stand are stacks of composition notebooks, idea journals, sketches (she is visual) and pile after pile of church music – old hymnals, new downloads of pieces she’s considering for her ukulele band, choir or handbell choir. On the floor are several heavy binders arranged in alphabetical order with the music already played, binders from the 30 years of experience as a minister of music. There is yet another stack reserved for pieces she’s considering playing with Jim, her brilliant guitarist. Lining the walls are ukuleles, a few guitars, a cello, a keyboard, several music stands, more stacks of the original recordings of her albums (note: they are not stored as sacred artifacts. Rather, they are piled willy-nilly for easy reference). My wife is a Yamaha artist (look it up) and her constantly shifting studio topography (ever-moving piles) is testament to the music in her soul, her very-long history of artistry.

Now, I’ve sung a song or two in the shower. When I met Kerri I told her that I didn’t sing and she fairly quickly called my bluff. I sing in her choir. I delight in singing with her and Jim. They are kind and pretend that I add something to their mix. Nowadays I can even pick out a slow tune on the ukulele!

All of this, however, does not make me capable of really understanding how Kerri plays or composes. I can pluck a note. I can warble a song. I will, however, never have mastery of all the instruments, I will never approach her capacity to transpose on the fly, or compose poetry and melody. I will never hear the nuance she hears, the music of silence. I do not have a natural gift of music nor an entire lifetime to exercise and explore it.

I do not know the tricks of the trade she has accumulated over decades of honing her expertise. Nor do I know the knowledge base she brings about other artists, other musicians and compositions, the instrumentation, the way she ‘feels’ an audience and adjusts, the very technical details and the very heart-based intuitions she has learned through many, many years of study and practice. I can’t understand or even try to predict the amount of time it takes (or doesn’t take) for her to conceptualize, to explore, to create, to review, to assess, to adjust, to re-create. I can respond to her work but I cannot define it, nor would it be credible for me to even try to do so. Out of respect for her work, this ‘music’ that is one of the essential things that define her, I know that I really have no idea. I will never approach all that she knows. What I can do is appreciate the enormity of her talent, the endless hours of study, pursuit, practice, passion, experimentation, frustration, rehearsal, writing, performance, teaching, research, recording, pondering, pounding and playing and playing and playing – a lifetime of experience – that has brought her to this place where she creates beautiful music that seems to take no effort whatsoever.

Making it look easy. It takes a lifetime. The woman who delivers our mail has been a postal carrier for 30 years. It is hubris to think I know what that takes. It is utter arrogance to think I could pick up a mailbag and simply know what she knows, do what she does. Experience is invisible. Value is too easily reduced to dollars and cents. As Kerri wrote yesterday, with regard to anyone, the work they do, the life-path they bring to their work, we have no idea. It is both humbling and respectful to take a step back and consider the invisible, to remember that what appears easy comes from years and years of very hard work.

 

read Kerri’s blog post on KS FRIDAY

 

 

their palettes website box copy

 

Filed under: Art, Creativity, KS Friday, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Mix It [on DR Thursday]

Posted on March 21, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

palette copy

True confessions: I never clean my palette. I like the messy build up of color. I like the chunky texture. It serves as a gunky history of my work, a genealogy of paintings past. And then, over time, it becomes a tactile work of art in its own right. Unfettered by any of the mental gymnastics or over-ponderous considerations that plague my “real” work, it is the closest to child-mind that I will achieve. It is accidental. It is free.

This might be a stretch but it is, for me, nevertheless true. I love my palette because it is the place of alchemy in my artist process. It is the true liminal space. I begin with pure color. I smashed the pure color together with another color and transform it into a third color, the hue I intend. On a palette, color becomes intention. And then, once transformed, with a brush or knife I lift the color-intention from my palette and in an action that is often more responsive than creative, I place it onto a canvas. It transforms yet again relative to all the color it touches. An image emerges. More color is called for.

And, somewhere in this call and response of color, I become like the palette. The pass-through of alchemy, the door that color passes through en route to something beautiful. And, in the process, perhaps I, too, in my messy build up of life/color, grow closer to that child mind. Unfettered. Accidentally interesting. Free.

“You never know what is enough until you know what is more than enough” ~ William Blake

 

read Kerri’s blog post about my PALETTE

 

roadtrip reading website box copy

 

Horses FullSize copy

untitled, mixed media 48 x 48IN

 

 

 

 

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Yawn! [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on March 20, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

wide mouth babycat copy

As I’ve mentioned before, BabyCat is not a stealthy kitty. When he jumps off the bed it sounds like someone dropped a cannonball on the wood floor. Mice feel particularly safe in his realm because they can hear him coming from a mouse-mile away.  That, and BabyCat can’t be bothered to actually chase mice. He prefers to yawl while watching them skitter (note: a yawl is a two-masted sailing vessel but I think it is also a near perfect match for the sound BabyCat makes when not-mousing. My apologies to sailors worldwide for my cat-sound-co-opt-yawl-onomatopoeia).

Often, we write these posts from the raft with BabyCat snoozing at Kerri’s side and DogDog chewing his bone at the aft of the raft. When the posts are written, prior to posting, we read them aloud to each other. Inevitably, in mid-read, BabyCat yawns a mighty yawn. Commentary? Oxygenation? Both, most likely. He is not a fan of having his post-breakfast snooze interrupted by our blather.

After his mighty yawn he yowls at us (we are not mice so the vowel is different), and hops off the raft (cannonball drop) and thump-thumps off to find a quieter spot, a place to take his pre-lunch nap.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about WIDE MOUTHED BABYCAT

 

babycatContemplating website copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Pattern, Random, studio melange, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Release The Peace [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on March 19, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

prayer flags copy

Peace. Compassion. Strength. Wisdom. The idea is that prayers and mantras symbolized on the flags are blown by the wind, spreading their peace, compassion, strength and wisdom into the world. It’s not a bad idea. It’s not a bad reminder.

We pass beneath our prayer flags everyday. It is our version of the Balinese split gate. A symbol of bigger things. Coming or going we pass through a moment of meditation, a fluttering reminder of the path that threads through time’s center. The place of presence. It is the place where divisions fade – even for a moment. The place where the drama-of-the-day and turmoil – all expressions of separation – fall away.

The flags quiver and dance. We stop and listen to the quiet flapping, the release of peace into the wind. The basic elements of compassion, strength, and wisdom. Water, fire, earth and sky. A renewed focus.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about PRAYER FLAGS

 

archeswebsitead copy

 

Filed under: Awakening, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Bust Yourself [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 18, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

something wrong with me box copy

As you know, I am a lover of the paradox. Among my favorite incongruities in this American culture is the hyper-celebration of the individual amidst the hyper-pressure to swim in the mainstream. To belong by standing out. To be distinct by shopping the brand stores. Within our national schizophrenia, we are, each of us, a festival of quirks, a riot of split intentions.

I laughed out loud when 20 told us his grocery store story. Standing in an aisle of hundreds of soap brands; ice-blue, blossom-pink, orange-orange, lemon-yellow, cool lilac… stacked taller than most people can reach, 20 carefully scrutinized all of the bottles. He gasped! He spotted a bottle of dish soap that seemed to have an ounce more in it! Elated, he looked left and right to make certain no other shopper had yet seen what he saw. With stealth, he reached way to the back of the shelf to snag his prize. The hunter trapped his game and wrestled it into his basket. He quickly sped from the aisle putting distance between him and other dish-soap-hunters. “There must be something wrong with me!” he exclaimed laughing at himself.

A mountain of choices, an ounce of triumph. Do you recognize it? Life lived in the paradox. It is in our national dna.

It makes for a festival of beautiful quirks. A riot of split intentions. We laugh when we bust ourselves standing in the paradox. You’ll know you are there when through your amusement you exclaim, “There must be something wrong with me.”

 

read Kerri’s blog post on SOMETHING WRONG

 

 

closeup at jonathans website box copy

 

 

 

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Random, studio melange, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

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