DR Thursday | The Direction of Intention

Do A Rough Draft [on DR Thursday]

Posted on October 4, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

the field in early october: a morsel

I love seeing artists’ rough drafts. One of my all time favorite art exhibits was the hundreds of drawings and sketches John Singer Sargent executed en route to his painting, El Jaleo.

I’m more interested in the process than the final piece. I’m more captivated by the search than the find. That includes my own work as well. For me, the final painting is less a finished piece and more of a pause in the conversation.

It bothers me when a curator tells people what a painting is about or what the artist intended. I’ve squirmed many times during openings of shows when the gallery curator, introducing my work, tells people what my paintings mean. It locks people out. It prevents them from having THEIR relationship with my painting. I squirm equally when the work is not mine. I want a more pure experience.

To me, art is a doorway to the sacred, to the deeper things that words often cannot reach. It is a passage back to the beginning, to the fingerpainter, the child freely playing – prior to the time when a judge is planted between the painter and the piece, the painting and the viewer. That is where the riches are. And in that place it is all a rough draft.

read Kerri’s blog post about THE FIELD IN EARLY OCTOBER

like what?

a field in early october/morsel ©️ 2018 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Uncategorized | Tagged: art, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, el Jaleo, fingerpainter, john singer sargent, judgment, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, painting, purity, relationship, rough drafts, Sacred, seeker, sketches, society6.com/davidrobinson, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Fly Between The Poles [on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 27, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

a morsel from ‘angel.’ kerri calls it ‘you can’t hold the sun’

Icarus‘ wings were made of wax and feathers. His father, Daedalus, made them so he and Icarus could escape their imprisonment. Before taking flight, Daedalus warned Icarus not to fly too low nor too high. Icarus flew too close to the sun, the wax melted and his wings fell apart. He fell from the sky and drowned.

We see most of the Greek stories sifted through a post-Greek moralistic lens. Fly to high, hubris. Fly too low, complacency. The world as defined by polarities. Heaven, hell. Good, bad. Right, wrong. There’s another possibility.

Quinn used to tell me that the point of all the world’s religions, the message in all the great stories, is to find the middle way. To live in the center. This world, he said, will try its best to tug you to the extremes. It will dose you with propaganda, half truths. It will glorify US and demonize THEM. It will bamboozle you into twisted notions like ‘the dehumanization of others is okay.’ It is the lucky person that realizes that it is impossible to strip others of their humanity without also losing their own. Polarities are like that.

So, seek balance. Walk between the tug of the poles. It is the point of presence – live here, not in the scary future nor the regrettable past. Fly, not too close to either pole, but through the middle. Now. It’s possibly the point of the story.

This morsel is called You Can’t Hold The Sun. It’s true. You can’t stop time. No moth can withstand the flame. The sun will melt your waxy wings. The sea will make your feathers heavy with dew. Either way, you fall.

In the face of too much moralizing, Kerri will say, “If it’s not about kindness or joy, it’s not about anything.” That’s a statement from the center. I like to think that this center place, this middle way that Quinn told me about, is what we call love.

angel, acrylic on 2 panels, 48 x 24IN

icarus, acrylic on canvas, 30.5 x 59.5IN

www.kerrianddavid.com

you can’t hold the sun/angel ©️ 2018/2004 David Robinson

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: balance, center, daedalus, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, icarus, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, love, middle way, presence, religion, society6.com/davidrobinson, stories, sun, wings | Leave a comment »

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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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

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

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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.