Edges | The Direction of Intention

Find The Edge [on KS Friday]

Posted on September 27, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

galena songbox copy

There are those rare and precious moments when the enormity of life overtakes the minutia. When we realize that life is unimaginably large and we are impossibly small. Those moments always happen at edges. Edges of canyons. Edges of daylight. Edges of loss or birth.

My wedding day was such an edge. Once, I looked through a telescope into infinite space. That was an edge. A mountaintop at sunrise. Sitting on a beach after a relationship ended. Crystal stars dancing in a desert sky at night.

Galena is a place. It is a metaphor. It is Kerri’s composition alive with what happens at those edges: deep profound appreciation.

GALENA on the album RELEASED FROM THE HEART is available on iTunes & CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about GALENA

galena/released from the heart ©️ 1995 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Edges, Gratitude, KS Friday, Uncategorized | Tagged: appreciation, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, edges, enormity of life, galena, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerri sherwood on itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life, released from the heart, studio melange | 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 »

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

holding steadfast/blueprint for my soul ©️ 1996 kerri sherwood

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 »

Posted on August 23, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

the way home songbox 2 copy

In mythic journeys, coming home, arriving back at the place where the adventure began, is sweet and sour. There is nothing better than returning home to comforts, patterns, and relationships that previously provided solid identity and definition. However, no one goes on an adventure without being changed by it. In other words, you arrive home but you are not the same person who left. Home didn’t change. You did.

Today, so far from home, navigating the dark woods and dark forces that come with every adventure, I especially appreciate Kerri’s gorgeous composition THE WAY HOME. It reminds me that the gift of the adventure is to open my eyes, to feel and revel in the ocean’s spray as we sail toward the edges of the earth. The dark woods, the unknowns, the trials and tribulations, are, after all, the transformers. They are the agents of change. To step beyond a comfort zone, to seek adventure, is to invite…discomfort (I know, a no-duh).

In our uncharted waters I am, on this day, most grateful for my wife’s captivating and inspiring reminder that, even this shaky-ground-discomfort, is a solid step on THE WAY HOME.

THE WAY HOME on the album THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY is available on iTunes & CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about THE WAY HOME

the way home/this part of the journey ©️ 2000 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Edges, KS Friday, Uncategorized | Tagged: adventure, change, comfort zone, dark woods, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, discomfort, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, the way home, this part of the journey, transform | Leave a comment »

Stand On Any Street Corner [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on August 12, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

kindness kerouac copy

For reasons that are beyond my pay-grade to comprehend, human beings are obsessed with seeing conflict and division. The news of the day is generally antagonistic and despair-inducing – and that is not unique to our day. Ancient temples and modern televisions alike are overrun with images of war and hostility.

One of the greatest powers a human being can achieve is the power of focus placement. ‘Seeing’ is, after all, a matter of choice. It is not passive. In any given moment there are multiple points of focus, there are multiple stories, there are many interpretations to choose from.

Stand on any street corner and watch the world happen. Watch the overwhelming number of acts of kindness and generosity. The small moments of simple kindness and consideration. They are everywhere. People giving way, making way, helping. You will be surprised to find that the kindnesses by far outnumber the rudeness, the antagonism.

Stand on any street corner and watch where your focus goes. In the midst of a tsunami of kindness, if you are human and like all other humans, your focus will be captured by the angry guy honking his horn, the commuter shouting at the bus driver. “Such an angry world,” you think and close your eyes, despairing. Anger is so much louder than kindness.

Tell a story of discord, see a story of discord. Practice a story of discord, live a story of discord. Discord is easily leveraged. Division is easily sold. It is like selling candy to a kid. It is readily chiseled into pillars and hungrily read into teleprompters. It is so easy to see.

Tell a story of kindness, see a story of kindness. Practice a story of kindness, live a story of kindness. Although it is more readily available it is, somehow, more difficult to see. It is less sell-able and, so, is discarded as trite. It requires choice and discernment rather than default. It requires opening your eyes and your story to what is actual, what lives beyond the thundering chorus of conflict-peddlers.

The angry shooters and tweet-happy presidents live on the far margins yet they garner the majority of the attention. Stand on any street corner and open your eyes. There is a sweeping quiet kindness that permeates the vast majority, that defines the middle ground. You can see it if you so choose.

read Kerri’s blog post about KINDNESS

kerri designed some ‘be kind’ buttons. you can get them here

Filed under: Edges, Merely A Thought Monday, Seeing, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: anger, choice, conflict, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, generosity, jack kerouac, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, news, power, seeing, story, storying, studio melange | Leave a comment »

What Would You Give? [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on July 10, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

tim lake box copy

At the end of his life, Tom told me that, when reviewing his time on this earth, what he most valued, what made his life rich, was not the triumphant play openings or any achievement, title, or status symbol that he’d accumulated. It was the ordinary moments, the infinitely unimportant moments that gave color and shape to his story. Sitting on the porch with his aunt Bunty. Teaching his second grade class. Burning trash with his grandfather. As a boy, racing across the unplowed fields.

It sounds like a cliché’, doesn’t it? We hear it over and over again but rarely heed the wisdom. It is in the ordinary that the extraordinary is found. Pay special attention to the utterly normal and life will burst open and flow.

The film ABOUT TIME has ascended to the top of my favorites list. We watched it more than a few times this week. The quote says it all. Live everyday as if it was the final day in this extraordinary, ordinary life. It reads like a cliché’.

And yet, a few weeks ago I stared into my father’s eyes, and for a few moments he did not know who I was. Dementia is leading him away. I know that soon there will come a day when he will not come back. On that day, what might I give to simply sit and have a chat with my dad? Something so ordinary. Something beyond price.

read Kerri’s blog post about LIVING EVERYDAY

Filed under: Awakening, Edges, Family, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: about time, alive, awareness, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, extraordinary, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, live life, ordinary, presence, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Watch Their Steps [on KS Friday]

Posted on June 7, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

BABYSTEPS songbox copy

In preparation for writing these posts I always begin by first listening to the piece that Kerri has selected for the melange. This piece, BABY STEPS, made me all mixed up inside; quietly happy and unbearably sad. Although I did not have children of my own, I’ve had plenty of pals who have. It has been and continues to be a great gift to me when they share their joy in all of the baby steps.

I am also of an age where many of my pals, like me, have aging parents. There is a return to baby steps on the other side of life that, although natural, although a part of the process of living, are impossibly sorrowful. My dad’s struggles, his return to taking small tenuous steps, break my heart on a daily basis.

I believe it is the gift of an artist to help us make sense of the untenable as well as the miraculous. My wife, Kerri, has an enormous gift. Listen to her BABY STEPS. It will transport you, like it does me, through the fields of joy and sorrow, to the heart-full side of life.

BABY STEPS on the album RIGHT NOW is available on iTunes & CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about BABY STEPS

Filed under: Edges, KS Friday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: baby steps, children, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, joy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, parenthood, parents, right now, sorrow, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Pace And Shed [on DR Thursday]

Posted on May 23, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

underpainting

Like all artists I pass through periods of discontent with my paintings. They become like ill-fitting clothes. I want to shed them. I’m embarrassed to claim them. I start poking around for something new. Something that fits.

It took me more than a few cycles of discomfort to realize that discontent was actually a gift. It is the leading edge of curiosity, the fire storm that makes way for rejuvenation. Artists are not immune to holding on tightly to the safety and comfort of what they know and need a good dose of discontent to loosen their grip. At least I do.

Discontent makes me range around. Try stuff. Tear things up. Scribble furiously. Wonder if my muse has abandoned me (feel sorry for myself). Make really bad art (not on purpose). Make really bad art (on purpose). Take walks.

Discontent allows my empty well to refill. It pops any illusion I might carry of perfection. It turns my ship and hoists full-sail toward the edge of the world. And, it is always when I sail into uncharted waters that I find my muse waiting. She drums her fingers and says, “I thought you’d never get here.”

Ten years ago, when becalmed in the middle of my artistic ocean, I saw a pile of tissue paper in the corner of my studio. In a fit of why-not-nothing-else-is-working, I tore pieces of tissue and slapped them onto the painting-of-my-discontent. There sat my long missing muse, fingers drumming. “Texture,” she yawned. “You might want to see where this takes you.”

It’s taken me a long way. And, to my surprise, just a few weeks ago, I woke up and my paintings, like ill-fitting clothes, no longer fit me. I look at them as if someone else painted them. “Yikes,” I thought, “I hope no one saw these…” My muse packed her bags. She is nowhere in sight. I paced a little. Discontent like fog descended.

read Kerri’s blog post about UNDERPAINTING