Art | The Direction of Intention

Await The Wind [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on October 8, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

windblown flags copy

when the wind is perfect,
the sail just needs to open and the world is full of beauty.
Today is such a day. ~ (a slice of) On A Day by Rumi

Skip wrote. His sail is open and he is full of the beauty of this world. It’s all around, the sounds, the smells, the tastes, the color and movement. Basking in the early fall sunshine.

He’s been painting regularly and I teased him: the gift of painting is the practice in seeing. Only I wasn’t teasing. It’s true. Paint everyday and something happens. Seeing is not a passive act, it is an active engagement. A relationship that opens awareness both subtle and profound.

His email stopped me in my rush to get through the day. Getting through life requires a closed sail, dulled senses. I dropped my list and imagined importance and went outside. I haven’t touched my brushes in weeks. Skip asked if I’d taken my painting materials to the island. I did but never went near them. “Too much to do,” I kept telling myself.

I told Horatio that I felt empty. The island took a lot. NO-ART-IN-ME. He smiled and assured me that the wind will return. My sail will open again.

Brushes or not, as Skip reminded me, the world is full of beauty. Today.

read Kerri’s blog post about WIND

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Seeing, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: art, artisrty, beauty, creativity, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, painting, presence, Rumi, seeing, Skip | Leave a comment »

Simplify [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 26, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

Horatio challenged me to do something different. I’ve long wanted to explore simplicity of line and image so I took his prompt. Simplicity. There are few variations of this image.

When I get back to the studio I will pick up my brushes and Horatio’s prompt. I could use a walk back into simplicity.

This version is Judy’s favorite. So many of my conversations with Judy are about a healthy inner life – and how there really is no separation between inner and outer life. It’s a word game to dice life up into boxes. It’s a simplicity and the thread is easy to follow: as within, so without.

read Kerri’s blog post about INNER LIFE

inner life, 36 x 24IN

sacred series: inner life ©️ 2017 david robinson

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Uncategorized | Tagged: david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, inner life, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, simplicity, studio melange | 2 Comments »

Blow Up Your Feathers [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 19, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

EarthInterrupted3 copy 2

Earth Interrupted. This painting is the third in the series. It’s not as political as it might seem. Every time change comes an earth is interrupted. Configurations dismembered and then reconfigured.

A long time ago, when working with groups on perspective shifts, I used the phrase, “Blow up your feathers so they can re-settle in a new pattern.” I liked the phrase because I love the notion that thoughts are just so many feathers that have settled into a random pattern.

This series was (and is) my attempt to blow up my artistic feathers, to interrupt my earth. My feathers are still airborne. I’ll let you know when my earth settles down, when my feathers find a new pattern.

read Kerri’s blog post about E.I. III

E.I. III, 48x36IN, mixed media

earth interrupted III ©️ 2018 david robinson

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Pattern, Uncategorized | Tagged: configuration, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, earth interrupted, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, pattern, perspective, perspective shift, reconfiguration, studio melange, thought | Leave a comment »

Choose Your Ladder [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on September 17, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

ladders copy

Climbing the ladder to success has never been a useful metaphor for me. When ladder climbing, the trajectory is up. What is up there that is not already right here? Climbing up in this dog-eat-dog paradigm implies climbing over others. It certainly implies that there is a top rung with room enough for one. Limited pie. Get yours. After all, being your brother’s/sister’s keeper is a nice sentiment on Sunday but not really useful in the real world of ladder climbing.

Top rung. Ultimate achievement. Arrival. These are words of stasis. I’ve never understood why the elimination of dynamic movement would be appealing. Vitality is movement, not the absence of movement. Life is made rich by experience, surprise, curiosity, exploration, steps into the unknown. To climb the rungs to controlled living seems antithetical to the point, at least to me. A body in stasis is in poor health, indeed. A life in stasis is in poor spirit, without exception.

It is often the role of the artist to challenge the norm and the challenge is generally nothing new, rather, it is a simple perspective spin. For instance, a ladder is good for fixing things, for reaching. It is good ladder behavior to have someone spotting the climber. If someone is stuck at the top it is good practice to help them down. Fire departments use ladders to save people. Ladders to help. Ladders to serve. Ladders as a tool to reach. Ladders can be used to bridge a crevasse, to get folks to the other side.

A more useful (and realistic) ladder metaphor: reach, serve, help, bridge, save. I suppose, more to the point, success is all about the ladder you choose. As for me, standing atop a ladder on a rung built for one seems like a lousy definition of success. I’d rather be on the ground with the people who care enough to spot me. I’d rather use my ladder to help my friends and community reach the unreachable. That seems like a more worthy definition of success.

read Kerri’s blog post about LADDERS

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Metaphor, Perspective, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: climbing the ladder, community, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, dog eat dog, friends, helping hands, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, ladder, limited pie, metaphor, reach, studio melange, success | Leave a comment »

Capture The Beauty [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 12, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

sketch copy

The day was stormy, the lake was unsettled, steel grey and roiling. Kerri walked to the water’s edge with her camera. I opened my sketchbook and caught a quick sketch. Perhaps a notation for a someday-painting. Perhaps a gesture with nowhere to go.

A few days later I looked at this quick sketch and laughed. It is a metaphor for our time on island. Standing at the edge of a storm not of our making. Witness to the turmoil. It blows us to and fro. It messes our hair. The sand stings our faces. We are taken by the colors of its violence. When the winds grow too powerful, we retreat to the safety of our littlehouse. We wait for the latest flurry to calm, the waves to soften.

It is tempting to want to be done with it. To rush through a month of life. Each day I remind myself to be in it, not simply get through it. Life on this day may be stormy. It might be upsetting. Stormy and upsetting are colors on the palette. They are worthy experiences. Amidst the chaos there are instances of utter beauty – like the moment Kerri walked to the edge of a roiling lake and I looked up, caught my breath, and reached for my sketchbook so that I’d never ever forget.

read Kerri’s blog post about A SKETCH

http://www.davidrobinsoncreative.com

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Edges, Metaphor, Uncategorized | Tagged: beauty, chaos, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, gesture, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, metaphor, palette, sketch, society6.com/davidrobinson, storm, studio melange, washington island | 2 Comments »

Give It [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on September 11, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

half and half copy

Janus is a Roman god with two faces. He looks to the future and peers into the past. He is the god of beginnings and endings, transitions, doorways, and passages. He is the god of gateways, the liminal spaces, the between.

Janus must certainly be the god that we dance with on this island, a community defined by divisions, married to its conflicts but also, at least rhetorically, desiring peace.

Kerri and I are the stewards of a performing arts center that is, as Julian Dawson said, punching above its weight. It is the symbol of division in the community, the epicenter of discord, the rope in a very ugly tug-of-war. All of the fault lines run through it. Yet, as Janus would remind us, it then must also hold the path to unity, the potential for common ground.

All in the community want the doors to be wide open; none want the responsibility that comes with access. They want the center, the art, to serve them. They do not yet comprehend that any alive and vital art space is, in fact, the opposite: a place of service to others. Arts spaces and the artists the enliven them are keepers of the commons, the stewards of the stories that unite.

In another life I ran an educational theatre company. It boomed into life the day that the artists, the students, grocked that art was in fact a gift given to others, something they brought to people, not something (like attention or fame or a spotlight) that they got from people.

This island, this center, will someday boom into life. They will discover that the rope in the tug of war goes slack when they walk toward each other. Pulling in opposition exhausts everyone. They will come alive when they cease asking, “What do we get?” and start asking, “What do we bring?”

read Kerri’s blog post about EDGES

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Edges, Flawed Wednesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: art, artists, common ground, community, cooperation, creativity, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, janus, julian dawson, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, peace, service, trueblood performing arts center, unity, washington island | 1 Comment »

Contrast [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on September 10, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

contrast principle copy

It is the ultimate cliche’: we only know light because of dark. 20 calls this the contrast principle. Images juxtaposed illuminate. It’s how stories are told in film. Once. Upon. A. Time. It is how images pop off the canvas, blue next to orange, green meets purple. Contrast makes the eye move. Contrast makes shapes emerge. Movement has no meaning without stillness.

It’s relative. Related. Relationship. Without relativity, without contrast, nothing makes sense. Or, more to the point, nothing is sensed. Difference, in fact, is the secret sauce necessary for knowing anything. Category. Class. Classification. Group. What is like what? What is related? What is unrelated? Cubicle. Caste. Lines on a map.

Contrast can be wielded like a sword. They are not us. Division.

Or, contrast can be used to unify. A crossroads of diverse perspectives, innovation.

Nature is dynamic at its edges. Water meets beach. Earth meets water. Air breathes fire. Hot meets cold. Convection current. Contrast. Changing energies. Creative movement.

Kerri stopped during our walk. “Look!” she exclaimed. Her eye was drawn to the lone daisy in the midst of the sea of black-eyed susans. “Beautiful,” she whispered as she approached with her camera. “Look at the contrast.”

So similar. So different. Yellow meets white. Black meets yellow.

read Kerri’s blog post about CONTRAST

daisy in the black-eyed susans ©️ 2019 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Edges, Identity, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: contrast, contrast principle, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, difference, Diversity, division, innovation, juxtaposition, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, relationship, relativity, sense making, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Open To It [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on September 4, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

stripes of grey copy

I stood gobsmacked on the deck. The horizon, the straight line bank of clouds. It was a piece of contemporary art worthy of Richard Diebenkorn or Ellsworth Kelly. A study in grays and greens and purples. Monumental.

Sometimes I forget that the very best art can only approximate what already exists in nature. Try to capture the totality of a sunset. We simply can’t do it. We can approach the feeling but our scope will always be smaller, less dimensional. Our work is to see it – to see beyond the thought of it. To dance with it. To be vulnerable to it. To share the dance.

Last night we saw author/musician Michael Perry on stage. He closed his performance with thoughts about gratitude. He told his audience that, as an artist, he is vulnerable every time that he takes the stage or publishes a book. Opening himself to the thoughts and judgements of others is not an easy thing to do. It is, however, a necessity for an artist. But, here’s the gift: vulnerability becomes gratitude. If you are never vulnerable, living in a fortress, you will never arrive at gratitude. Gratitude is forged from the fire of vulnerability.

Openness begets openness. There is a full spectrum of color, an embarrassment of riches that vibrates between vulnerability and gratitude. Grays and greens and purples. Stand on the deck and open to it. Stand on the stage and open to it. Stand with your neighbor and open to it. The best of contemporary art. Monumental.

read Kerri’s blog post about GRAY

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Flawed Wednesday, Gratitude, Uncategorized | Tagged: contemporary art, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, ellsworth kelly, Gratitude, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, michael perry, nature, open, open heart, open mind, richard diebenkorn, vulnerability | Leave a comment »

Persevere [on KS Friday]

Posted on August 30, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

holdingsteadfast songbox copy

To me, the album cover is like a time capsule. The woman who would become my wife looking through a camera lens into a future unimaginable. Over twenty years later, I look back, peeking through that triangular keyhole, the impish woman, the near smirk. Does she know the path she will walk, the mountains she will climb? The falls she will take? The sturdy resilient woman she will become?

The impishness remains intact. The brat with the wicked laugh I adore even when – especially when – I am the object of her rascal-nature. The kind of perseverance developed over a lifetime. Clinging to the cliff, against all odds, holding steadfast through the storm. This mettle must have already existed in her blueprint! And, look what life built from that blueprint! A ferocious and very kind soul. An artist.

HOLDING STEADFAST from the album BLUEPRINT FOR MY SOUL is available on iTunes & CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about HOLDING STEADFAST

gate f8 website box copy

Filed under: Art, Edges, Emergence, KS Friday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: artist, artistry, blueprint for my soul, brat, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, holding steadfast, imp, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, perseverance, rascal, resilience, soul | Leave a comment »

Constellate [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on August 26, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

Just outside our favorite island gem, Fair Isle Books, is this poem by former Wisconsin poet Laureate, Bruce Dethlefsen. We have stopped at the shop more than once and reread the poem.

our lonely stars though bright
and strong will quickly fade

unless we string the stars
together choose illumination
then in constellation hope is ours

bring on another day
sing light in common song
~constellation by bruce dethlefsen

It is a lovely poem and captures perfectly how we now see our work on this island. In our short tenure it has become abundantly clear that the people in our sphere most often work as “islands.” Islands on island. That is, although very well intended, few actually recognize the impact of their actions (or inaction) on others. It is part of the evolutionary dna of the place. Everyone works multiple jobs. Divisions and territory define the island arts organizations.

I have long held (and experienced again and again) that the arts cannot thrive in a community until the artists turn to a common center, recognize a shared purpose, and realize that one cannot thrive without the other. Thriving is a team sport. If one theatre creates a large audience then it creates audience for all. If one painter sells a painting, a market is created for all. Reaching into the common space, facilitating shared experience, is what art is meant to do.

If an arts community falls into the mistaken notion that its members compete for limited resources, they will inevitably define themselves by their limitation. The center turns to a battle ground and the art is diminished. Dog-eat-dog has no place in the sacred space of art.

It is why we visit the poem. The necessary guide star is already here. “Our lonely stars though bright will quickly fade unless we string the stars together – choose illumination – then in constellation hope is ours.”

read Kerri’s blog post about CONSTELLATION