Posted on February 15, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
“Art is communion of one soul to another, offered through the symbolic language of form and content.” ~ Alex Grey, The Mission of Art
I just looked up the word “mystic” in the dictionary. Just as a word can clarify, it can also obscure. “Mystic” is one of those words. Mystic implies intention. A seeker. A receiver. Someone unique; out of the ordinary. Yet, who isn’t searching for a truth that dances beyond the intellect? We will – all of us – be “absorbed into the absolute” someday and each of us, in our own way, must reconcile our individual lives with our inevitable disappearance into unity. Everyone is a mystic, whether they realize it our not.
I’m sitting in our bed, it’s February, and the birds are singing outside. The sun is pouring through the window and I’m thinking of looking up another word: bask. The birdsong pulls my heart into springtime yet I want to issue a caution. Be careful, birds! Today feels like spring but tomorrow will feel like winter. Suddenly it occurs to me that, in their song, the birds are issuing a caution to me: Sing! Today is all you have. Luxuriate in the sun and quilts.
A few nights ago, at dinner, Brad told us of an initiative he’s launching at his work. It is cathedral building. Rather than legislating behavior they are, with great intention, cultivating an environment of inclusion. Equity, not rooted in reinforcing distinction and separation, but fostering a culture of belonging. Unity. Reaching for the truth that lives beyond words or intellect or legislation or rules or pronouns or… An everyday intention: the “communion of one soul to another.” A corporate initiative borne from a mystic impulse? Float all boats? Equality beyond lip-service? A bottom line AND a service motive?
It can happen. It is happening. I find that incredibly hopeful. Mystical, in fact. Artistic.
Some of my paintings have words incorporated. Some sensical and some nonsensical. Sometimes the letter serves as line. This painting from a series. It is called Earth Interrupted IV. It reminds me of a medicine shield. The words that populate it are not only sensical but sensible.
The challenge of the seeker is not to be separate from what you seek.
Sometimes you have to stand still and let what you seek catch up to you.
“…no one can tell us because life is not something which can be understood from a book.” ~Krishnamurti, Think On These Things
My sketchbook is part diary, part thought-catch-all, part quote repository, …and part sketchbook. And, sometimes the disparate rivers run together. A thought inspires an image, a sketch and a quote collide. Occasionally, on a day that the muse is sleeping or if I stumble into an experimental mood, I paint one of my collisions. And then, generally, I paint over it. The point of any experiment, in art as well as science, is to find out what works by discovering what does not work. Trailing behind me is a long line of mud, mess, and poor composition. Much of my finished work is the visible layer of a sedimentary strata of experiments.
Like the rest of humanity, I am a seeker. Seeking is the point of a sketchbook or a diary. Reflection. Capturing. Exploration. Elusive mastery. Fickle contentment. Status. Safety. Agreement. Peace.
We seek these things as if they were destinations. From my long line of mud and mess I’ve learned (and continue to learn) that none of what we seek is achievable. Seeking implies finding but that is a misnomer. Life moves. Meaning is fluid. There may be answers for a moment but they will, as they must, open greater questions. Or, they will be a borrowed answer, a truth found in a book, lived by the author, celebrated and shared but unincorporated in the reader.
It is a bird that you hold for a moment. A relationship with something wild. A relationship with yourself. The meaning flutters in your hands, opens you to an experience, and then will die if not released.
A sketchbook, this painting, No One Can Tell Us, is merely a trace left by that fluttering relationship. The top layer.
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.
Posted on January 14, 2017 by davidrobinsoncreative
“Our search for truth must be wide open, even when it takes us in directions we preferred not to go. This is the difference between propaganda and truth. Propaganda has a certain end in mind, and so it marshals and manipulates the ‘facts’ to support its conclusion. Truth weighs evidence, seeks proof, is appropriately skeptical of authoritarian claims, welcomes questions, and doesn’t fear dissent.”Philip Gulley, The Quaker Way of Living*
Kerri and I often read books aloud to each other. On cold winter days we sit beneath a blanket, Dog-Dog at our feet, BabyCat snoring by our side, sip coffee, and read. We like to discuss and compare perceptions, ask questions, and re-read passages for clarity or the simple poetry of the language. Sometimes we savor a book, moving through it slowly. Sometimes we devour a book and go back to reread especially potent sections.
“Propaganda resists close inspection and must continually be defended. Truth welcomes doubt and skepticism; indeed it is best served by questions, suggestions, and corrections.”
I am guilty of burying my head in the sand. My move to Wisconsin came with an intentional unplugging from the news. I was tired of pundits shouting each other down. I was weary and wary of conversations with family and friends that seemed to be territory-guarding regurgitations of our news-channel-of-choice. I was using the language given to me by my news sources and rolled my eyes at the predictable language leveled by the “other” side. One day as I raged at family members to pay attention to how they were being manipulated by their news source, I thought that it was probably a good idea for me to do the same. At the time, unplugging, stepping out of the toxic stream, seemed the only option to clear my mind.
“The search for truth begins within the seeker, for if we are not honest with and about ourselves, we will find it impossible to be honest with and about others.”
On a recent trip to Indiana, Bill and Linda suggested a book for us, The Quaker Way Of Living by Philip Gulley. They read it with their church group and found it compelling, especially given our corrosive political climate and collapse of civil discourse. We bought it when we returned home and a few days ago started reading it together. We couldn’t put it down. It asks some powerful questions. It doesn’t pretend to have answers [that, I’ve learned, would be the antithesis of the Quaker Way] but it does speak directly to the quandaries of personal and communal integrity in a climate of self-righteousness, blame, and distrust. It is hopeful and funny and places the onus of creating a better world squarely on the shoulders of each and every one of us. It reminded me that burying my head in the sand is not very useful while also affirming that their are options beyond planting a flag in the sand.
“To say a person has integrity means several things. Most commonly, we mean the person is honest, that his or her word can be trusted…. But there is another level of meaning that has to do with the integration of our values and lifestyle. In that sense, to say we have integrity is to say the separate parts of our lives combine to form a unified whole. What we believe is consistent with how we live. Our beliefs influence the work we choose, the way we use our time and spend our money, the relationships we form and the goals to which we aspire. This integration is critical for inward peace.”
While reading, I’ve been thinking a lot about a conversation I had a few years ago with Jim Marsh, one of the people I most admire in this world precisely because he walks his talk. He told me of an issue in his community that had deeply concerned him and that he’d been grousing about for long time. One day he’d had enough and to move forward he recognized that he had three options: First, to stop complaining (he said, “to just shut up.”). Second, to move away. Leave. Get away from the source of his irritation. That didn’t seem like a healthy option. The third was to strap on his boots and do something about it. To act instead of complain. But, (and here’s the reason why I adore him) not to act against, but to work to create what he wanted. His responsibility was not to fight or resist. It was to create.
“We preserve our integrity and wholeness when we are aware of what threatens it and then choose to act deliberately and prudently when tempted. When we fail to do this, we disintegrate, creating a chasm between who we are and who we wish to be.”
I practice tai chi and had the good fortune to have, for a few years, a master teacher, Saul, whose teaching transcended the specifics of tai chi. He was teaching me how better to live. One day, while I was in a fit of resistance, he quietly showed me the power of looking beyond my “opponent” and placing my focus, instead, in the field of possibility. I understood (intellectually) that the opponent was always of my own making and my dedication to having an opponent (inside or out) would always pull me off balance. In other words, as long as I invested in resistance I would always pull myself off balance.
“Integrity isn’t conditional…There is a seamless nature to integrity that transcends situations and relationships. Integrity does not present one face in public and another in private. It delights in transparency, having nothing to hide.”
Now, with my head freshly out of the sand, I understand Saul’s teaching beyond my thinking (I’ve had a lot of time to meditate on things with my head in the sand) and, taking my cue from Jim, I recognize that I have three options but only option-number-three holds the promise of integrity. The best news: no one creates alone…
*all quotes in this post are from the chapter on Integrity from The Quaker Way of Living by Philip Gulley
Posted on August 22, 2015 by davidrobinsoncreative
TODAY’S FEATURED REMINDER FOR HUMANS
There is a vast difference between the questions, “Why is this happening to me?” and, “What’s the opportunity in this?” Both questions are frames that we place on our experiences. Both questions determine the range of possibilities and choices we see in our lives. Why not place a frame that opens a vast range of possibilities instead of placing a frame that closes most of the doors?
It is a bird that you hold for a moment. A relationship with something wild. A relationship with yourself. The meaning flutters in your hands, opens you to an experience, and then will die if not released.
The Direction of Intention 