DR Thursday | The Direction of Intention

Make Them Visible [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 20, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

rough sketch (detail): and then they danced

When I first met Kerri she had two Adirondack chairs in the front yard. We spent many summer evenings in those chairs, sipping wine, talking through the sunset. One evening, she brought out her ipod and speaker. We listened to music while we chatted and then a song came up that inspired us to dance. We danced that song and then the next and the next. Soon, she was playing DJ. We wiggled and roared through her rowdy picks and lightly stepped through the slow songs. The first painting I did for her is about that evening. It’s called Dancing In The Front Yard.

This summer I have been empty. I left the studio in early June knowing there was nothing left. It was time to let the cup refill. Over the summer I’ve often visited the studio. I sat in my chair in the dark and felt the place. I’ve shuffled paintings around, reviewed my life’s work and wondered, as I always do in the empty times, if I’ve painted my last painting, if the deep well will ever replenish.

The other day, as always happens, I was passing through my studio en route to the tool room and something stopped me. The empty canvas propped against the easel shouted, “Look at me!” And I did. Turning on the lights I saw them, the dancers, the dancers in the front yard, and I laughed. Dancers. Of course. What a great welcome back; a celebration. A dance. Our dance. Like a thirsty man crawling to an oasis, I slowly entered the space, picked up the charcoal, and made my dancers visible.”Welcome back,” they whispered, as I dusted off my hands and reached for my brushes.

a process shot for Skip, step 2: underpainting

dancing in the front yard

read Kerri’s blog post about AND THEN THEY DANCED

(Lydia! I remembered two days in a row! Progress?)

www.kerrianddavid.com

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Uncategorized | Tagged: artistry, artists, creative process, dancing, dancing in the front yard, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, dry spell, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life purpose, life's work, paintings, process, society6.com/davidrobinson, what I am supposed to do | Leave a comment »

Stand Like An Aspen [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 13, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

a morsel from ‘instrument of peace.’ kerri calls this one ‘aspen stand’

It’s a common misperception. The notion that with accurate information, with clear data, people will change their perceptions/behaviors accordingly. They won’t. They don’t. In my past-life-consulting I said (too often), “If it was true that information changed behavior then no one on planet earth would smoke cigarettes.” We are not as rational as we like to believe. Our investments have little or nothing to do with the accuracy or truth of information.

In the same vein, e-connectivity does not necessarily equate to relationship. Connectivity is not relationship. As we are learning these days, people can be hyper connected but share no common ground. The endless capacity for connection comes with no guarantee of substance or shared truth. Swipe left. Click ‘like.’ Connected, but connected to what?

Relationship, on the other hand, is a living, moving, breathing shared story. It is shared experience. It comes with varying points of view. It needs no explaining. In relationship, disparate viewpoints are aimed at a shared center.

And, so, a metaphor. A painting: Aspen trees, we’ve learned, grow in “large clonal colonies, derived from a single seedling, and spread by means of root suckers; new stems in the colony may appear at up to 30–40 m (98–131 ft) from the parent tree. Each individual tree can live for 40–150 years above ground, but the root system of the colony is long-lived.” The root system transcends the individuals. What a terrific metaphor for a healthy community. The individuals come and go but the root, the shared root system, lives on and on and on.”

How appropriate (to me) that Kerri chose this morsel from my painting Instrument of Peace. She gave it the title, Aspen Stand. Peace, like every real relationship, is an aspen stand.

instrument of peace

sale ends september 16

read Kerri’s blog post on Aspen Stand

www.kerrianddavid.com

aspen stand/instrument of peace ©️ 2018/2015 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Metaphor, Uncategorized | Tagged: aspen, aspen stand, connectivity, data, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, information, instrument of peace, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, peace, relationship, society6.com/davidrobinson | Leave a comment »

See Simply [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 6, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

autumn hillside pair copy

Kerri’s morsel choice often surprises me but none more than this week. She took a close up photo of my painting We Watch The Setting Sun, flipped it over, made two copies, left one untouched and manipulated the other. “I want to use both!” she announced with THAT look in her eyes. “It reminds me of a hillside in the fall.”

I write this often, perhaps too often, but it matters: through the morsels I am discovering simplicity. In her Autumn Hillside set I see the freedom of my brushstrokes. I see the collision of thick paint and thin washes. I see simple color that, in its movement, serves as a suggestion. Less is more. Nothing else is needed. I understand Mark Rothko. I appreciate Ad Reinhardt. I am seeing their work through new eyes.

New eyes. Could there be a greater gift for an artist, for someone who has worked his entire life at ‘seeing?’

“Don’t you love it?” Kerri asked of the morsels. I smiled. Yes. I love it.

we watch the setting sun, acrylic on canvas, 24 x 36IN

september 1 – 16

read Kerri’s blog post about AUTUMN HILLSIDE

www.kerrianddavid.com

autumn hillside/autumn hillside night ©️ 2018 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Uncategorized | Tagged: acrylic painting, Ad Reinhardt, autumn hillside, autumn hillside night, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Mark Rothko, narrative series, painting, simplicity, society6.com/davidrobinson | Leave a comment »

Stop At The Beginning [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 30, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Aqua Agua Mit Rouge

Aqua Agua Mit Rouge. Kerri laughed and clapped her hands when she named this morsel. It is a process snapshot of the early under-painting, the base layer of what would become Earth Interrupted VII. It is loose, fluid and free. It is a special layer – a visual marker of what happens before my thinking mind kicks in. Free. Fluid. Loose. Flow. For me, the first moments of painting are all intuition.

More and more I am learning from these morsels. I’ve spent countless hours gazing at finished paintings asking myself how I might grow, become a better painter. Reach into deeper pools of experience. It is only recently – because of the morsels – that I am spending time gazing at my process, the previously unconscious parts, and asking the same questions. How do I grow? Become better? Become more Fluid? Loose? Free?

The answer of the moment is as funny as it is clear: stop at the beginning. See through the eyes of intuition, feel your way forward. Stop before that talky brain weighs in with all manner of blah blah blah.

earth interrupted VII, mixed media, 48 x 36IN

STAY TUNED! The FALL VIRTUAL GALLERY SALE starts this weekend. An announcement is coming!

read Kerri’s blog post about AQUA AGUA MIT ROUGE

www.kerrianddavid.com

aqua agua mit rouge/earth interuppted vii ©️ 2018 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Edges, Uncategorized | Tagged: big brushes, creative process, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, earth interrupted, flow, fluid, free, intuition, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, loose, morsels, painting, process, society6.com/davidrobinson, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Step Off The Treadmill [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 23, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

sunrise, sunset copy

The county fair is over. Kids are heading back to school. Parents are taking their all-grown-up children to college. The rituals of summer’s end are all around us.

I was delighted when Kerri chose this morsel for this week’s melange. It comes with good memories. I painted A DAY AT THE BEACH after an afternoon at the beach last year. We were in Plymouth. The day was waning. We wandered. We played word games in the sand (I lost miserably, Kerri gloated loudly), watched children squeal and play in the surf, felt the heat of the day cool as the sun dropped below the horizon, the breeze that comes with sunset. There was no place we needed to be. There was no place we’d rather be.

Isn’t that the gift of summer? An intentional pause. Giving yourself the gift of stepping off the treadmill, forgetting about the list of things-to-do? Sun and the space to play.

Master Miller has been sharing with us photos of his summer fun with his young son, Dawson. A day of surprises at the art museum. Coloring together, surrounded by crayons. Adventures for the sake of adventure. Art making for the sake of art making. Laughter in the discovery, the pure joy of shared experience.

All of this goodness comes to you in one little morsel. Kerri calls it Sunrise/Sunset.

A Day At The Beach, mixed media, 38 x 52IN

read Kerri’s blog post about SUNRISE/SUNSET

www.kerrianddavid.com

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sunrise-sunset/a day at the beach ©️ 2018/2017 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: DR Thursday, Gratitude, Play, Uncategorized | Tagged: a day at the beach, beach, cycles, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, end of summer, intentional pause, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Plymouth, presence, rituals, shared experience, society6.com/davidrobinson, studio melange, summer, sunrise, sunset, the melange | Leave a comment »

Sandcastle With Me [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 16, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

MorselSandcastle withMe copy

My favorite ongoing series of paintings is called The Narrative Series. I’ve been adding to the series since 1989. It is my least popular series if sales are the determining factor of popularity. Mostly people respond with, “I don’t get it.” When I painted my first, I loved it and thought to myself, “I don’t get it.” So, I’ll spend my life trying to get it, all the while, knowing that it is impossible to get. However, when I birth another in the line, I know it is the closest I come to the center (whatever that means). These paintings are stories in broken time or, in the cubist frame of reference, they are stories in multiple time.

A few years ago I attended a lecture series featuring Brian Greene and Stephen Hawking, theoretical physicists. They have two different theories of multiple universes and it was mind blowing to try and grasp both theories (who am I kidding, trying to grasp one was mind blowing). Brian’s was all about strings and Stephen’s was all about bubbles. The math works for both and I left the lecture with eyes crossed and reaching for sense. And I was thrilled. That day they were narrative painters, too.

Sandcastles and Me is a morsel of a recent addition to the narrative series, titled Spoons & Sandcastles (though you’ll find it in the Beach series folder on my site). If after looking at the morsel and the full painting you find yourself thinking, “I don’t get it.” Take heart. You are in good company.

Spoons & Sandcastles, acrylic on canvas 28 x 57.5IN

read Kerri’s blog post about SANDCASTLE WITH ME

www.kerrianddavid.com

sandcastle with me/spoons & sandcastles ©️ 2018 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Edges, Uncategorized | Tagged: Brian Greene, broken time, cubist, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, narrative, narrative series, society6.com/davidrobinson, Stephen Hawking, stories, string theory, studio melange, the melange, theoretical physics, time | Leave a comment »

Pray In Opposites [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 9, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

A Prayer Of Opposites, acrylic on panel, 48 x 48IN

I love this painting and for some reason have never included it in a show. An early version of it hung for a few years in the undergraduate offices of Antioch University, Seattle. After returning from Bali I took it down, hauled it back to the studio and repainted it.

On my gallery site I wrote about this painting that paradoxes and oppositions are lively topics for me. Truth is always found in the “in-between” spaces. Truth is connective tissue.

Separation is only the beginning of the life-story. The rest of the story is a search for connection. It is lived as a quest to find the common center – through a prayer of opposites. As the Balinese would say in shorthand, many faces, one god.

read Kerri’s blog post about A PRAYER OF OPPOSITES

www.kerrianddavid.com

LIKE US ON FACEBOOK

a prayer of opposites ©️ 2002/2018 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Uncategorized | Tagged: Bali, common center, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life story, meditation, oppositions, paradoxes, polarity, prayer, presence, quest, society6.com/davidrobinson, story, storytelling, studio melange, the melange, truth | Leave a comment »

Look Close-In [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 2, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Georgia O’Keeffe was a master painter of paradox. Her paintings open the expansive universe by focusing close in, approaching the mystical, the sensual through the minute. She expressed so much through minimal strokes. I suspect her paintings are an expression of how she lived. Standing still in the arroyo, listening. Moving inward to reach the outer spaces.

I am a artist of a by-gone century. While I appreciate the digital world (you would not be reading this without it), I love the visceral, the deep inner driver, the instinctual. I am tactile. I am fed by the feel of the brush moving across the canvas, the smell and splash of the paint, the dance. A world of possibilities and paths open when mistakes are not easily erased. Kerri calls this analog.

This is a morsel, a close-in crop of my painting, Earth Interrupted VII. Look closely and you will see the meeting ground of the methodical and the spontaneous, the controlled and the improvisational. I am learning from looking close-in. I see forces merged that used to be at odds, now good dance partners. Compliments. I, too, am learning to stand still, not in the arroyo but on the shores of Lake Michigan. Visceral. Listening. Moving inward in the hope of reaching the outer spaces.

earth interrupted VII

read Kerri’s post about this MORSEL

www.kerrianddavid.com

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Seeing, Uncategorized | Tagged: analog, artist, artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, detail, earth interrupted, energy, forces, Georgia O'Keeffe, instinct, instinctual, intuitive, inward looking, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, listening, morsel, mystical, sensual, society6.com/davidrobinson, studio melange, tactile, the melange | Leave a comment »

Let Me Bring Peace [on DR Thursday]

Posted on July 26, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

I identify the chapters of my life through specific paintings. There was the era of August Ride. There was the era of Shaman. Iconic marks a remarkable and productive period. This morsel is from An Instrument of Peace. It is the painting that marks the most recent phase, a creative left turn when alphabets and images ran together. It marks a time of paradox, tighter constraints and spontaneous freedoms, a time when I wandered lost in the only place I’ve ever known as home.

Midway through the painting process, working fast and loose, I picked up my charcoal and scribbled in one long string of letters The Prayer of St. Francis. I randomly repeated some words and phrases, ran them off the canvas. I sealed them in acrylic, smudging some of the characters.

Just like all the others, I knew An Instrument of Peace was a life-marker when I painted it. I knew it was the end of a cycle, a little death. Now, as I work and wait patiently for the new cycle, sometimes I go into my studio and tack this very large painting on the wall and sit with it. In this era of division and discord in our country, I think there might not be a better aspiration, a more relevant sentiment than this painting and poem suggest: where there is hatred, let me bring love.

An Instrument Of Peace, mixed media, 48 x 91IN

Peace products available at society6.com

read Kerri’s blog post about PEACE

www.kerrianddavid.com

August Ride

Shaman

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Uncategorized | Tagged: acrylic paintings, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life work, markers, meditations, milestones, peace, prayer, society6.com/davidrobinson, studio melange, the melange, the prayer of st francis | Leave a comment »

Collaborate & Hear Blue [on DR Thursday]

Posted on July 19, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

blue, blue, this world is blue

Kerri took a photo of a blue ball, the initial under painting for the next piece in my Earth Interrupted series. And then, giggling, she disappeared up the stairs. I knew the blue ball met its fate in Photoshop because her giggle became a full scale cackle. I call it “the design cackle.” I only hear it when she is reordering the visual world, when she drops out of the known reality (a shared space) and plays gleefully in designland (an internal space).

Later, when she reemerged, my distant-traveler wife, flipped her screen around. Instead of showing me an image, as I’d expected, she’d cued a song, Love Is Blue. “Have you ever heard this?” she asked, “The blue ball reminded me of this song.” As we listened. She told me the news of the day makes her blue. I learned which notes were blue. Finally, she opened the image for me to see. “I call it, “blue, blue, this world is blue. What do you think?”

It was a full blown experience in synesthesia, tasting words, seeing sounds.

Last week our neighbor, John, a terrific artist, asked if Kerri and I ever collaborate or discuss our work. I smiled, my answer as much a surprise to me today as it was the day after Kerri and I met. “Every day,” I said. Every day.

The latest morsel. Ours. Beautiful, bold, and primary.