shared fatherhood | The Direction of Intention

Scribble With Purpose [on DR Thursday]

Posted on February 9, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative

Henri Matisse said, “Creativity takes courage.” I suppose that is true when considering the enormous pressures to conform to a style or standard. To create what is acceptable or expected. To suss-out what will be rewarded with approval and/or profit. In this context, it takes enormous courage to deviate. To explore. To surprise yourself by breaking form and risking ridicule and rejection and poverty. In this context, it takes courage to show up. It takes courage to punch through.

On the other hand, creativity is the most natural thing in the world. Ask any child. On second thought, please don’t ask any child since it will only confuse them. They have no idea that creativity – to an adult – is a separate thing. What’s scary and vulnerable to the tall people is commonplace to the little critters. There’s help for the older folks: allow the child-inside to scribble with abandon. Recognize that the story of, “I’m not creative,” is a creative act. The story of “It’s scary to create,” is also a creative act. It’s a story.

Creativity runs like wild horses through every day of our lives. Our perceptions and interpretations and fears are pure storytelling. The real challenge is not the absence of creativity but the conscious appreciation of our rampant creativity. The squeeze to conform serves as a heavy curtain obscuring our vibrant expressiveness.

The courage that Henri Matisse references is borne of the tension between the desire to be appreciated (to fit in, to succeed) and the yearning to break new trail or sail into undiscovered lands. To risk. To intentionally and publicly scribble outside the lines. To say aloud what needs saying.

Creativity is the most natural thing in the world. As it turns out, so is conformity. We are, after all, like wolves: animals that run in a pack. Humans die in isolation so serving the will of the group is a high priority. The wrestling match between creativity and conformity is necessary.

The progressive impulse. The conservative impulse. A bowstring drawn taut between these two poles provides the necessary tension to send the arrow of our ideas and dreams sailing toward the distant target. Children scribble with abandon. Grown up children, those telling themselves the story of “I’m a creator,” learn to scribble with purpose.

read Kerri’s blogpost about PUNCHING THROUGH

shared fatherhood, 25.5X40.5IN, mixed media on panel

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Edges | Tagged: art, artistry, conformity, consciousness, courage, creative tension, creativity, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, deviation, Henri Matisse, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Matisse, paintings, progressive, purpose, scribble, shared fatherhood, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Let Fly [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on March 22, 2022 by davidrobinsoncreative

“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.” ~ Kurt Vonnegut, If This Isn’t Nice, What Is?: Advice For The Young

It is now my opinion, based on life’s experience, that it you don’t find the cliff, the cliff will find you. Wing development is the name of this game. Hide in the closet, bury your head in the sand, drink yourself to oblivion, pretend the monster is not at the door, and you’ll discover in your last moments that looking the other way was, in fact, your cliff.

Master Marsh once asked me why I had the need to run and jump off every cliff. At the time I said, “I don’t know!” My latent response comes straight from Vonnegut: wing development. Apparently my wings took their sweet time developing and needed some extra cliff-age. And, as we all know but are too polite or arrogant to admit, wing development never ceases. There’s always another cliff until there’s not.

We had a rare warm day so took a walk on our favorite trail. The brilliant raw sienna of the empty pod caught Kerri’s eye. While she took photos of the pod I thought about the thousands of seeds it once held that took flight on the wind. A few certainly found fertile soil. Most did not. That’s the idea behind Kurt Vonnegut’s advice. Don’t hoard your idea seeds. Put them out. Audition for the play. Submit your story. Offer your idea. There’s great truth to the advice: your job is to put it out there, not to decide whether or not it is good enough. Explode the pod rather than protect the seed.

Greg recently told me said, “it doesn’t have meaning until it’s published.” He wasn’t speaking about publishing in a newspaper or by Random House. Sending an email is an act of publishing. To text is to publish. Greg was referring to sharing. It has no meaning until it is shared. And, sharing your creations can be -and often is – vulnerable and scary. Giving a speech is terrifying to most people. Dancing, painting, composing a song, playing a solo, offering your idea in a meeting…all are acts of publishing. All are potential cliffs to jump off.

Explode the pod. Let the seeds fly. The wind will carry them. Some will find fertile soil. Most will not. Wing development is easier when you realize that you are a pod of ideas and not a judge of worth or value.

read Kerri’s blog post about THE POD

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Edges, Education, Identity, Metaphor, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: advice, artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, edges, ideas, judgment, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Kurt Vonnegut, nature, offer, risk, seeds, shame, shared fatherhood, story, studio melange, the melange, watercourse, wings | Leave a comment »

Try, Try Again [on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 5, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

This morning, as I looked through my stacks, I could find no more relevant painting for this day, for our times.

Ironically, I made two runs at this painting. Both times it evolved into something else. It started in violence and ended in shared fatherhood. In the final paintings, you cannot see is the inception, the original impulse, the story that made me pick up my brushes. Polynices and Eteocles. Brothers fighting for the control of the kingdom. Both die. They kill each other rather than share.

The story is ancient. Like all Greek stories, it’s a cautionary tale. It’s a story of fate. Oedipus’ children. An original sin playing to its inevitable conclusion. It’s been one of my metaphors for these now-ridiculous-united-states. Brothers fighting for control, forgetting that they are brothers. It’s a lose/lose story. Hubris kills all.

The mystery to me is why – in both attempts – did my if-wishes-were-fishes subconscious kick-in and transform this horror story into something positive? Out of the fire, I argue in the naive recesses of my being, we will forge a union.

I’ve always known that I am an idealist but, this morning, listening to the trickster fox whip its gullible crowd into an election fruit-smoothie, amplifying the bloviated rants of a shyster, creating fraud-fantasies from thin air, I recognize that I am perhaps the most foolish of all, the blue ribbon winner of witless. Perhaps not.

I will make a third go of this painting. I have the drawings. This time, my realist might punch through the wall of hopeful idealism. The tale is cautionary. It is ancient. It is worth telling. To look with clear eyes at “what is” does service to “what might be.”

Kerri just reminded me that, on our walk yesterday, I waxed poetic about how what we focus on matters. It’s true. Possibility needs to be firmly rooted in reality.

Bubbles always burst.

The brothers kill each other rather than share a kingdom. Is it their fate [our fate]? Is it inevitable – human nature – to be so blinded by the lust for control that we plug our ears to possibility, that we refuse to see the promise we lose in our petty penny struggle? Do people always need to sacrifice the greater for the lesser en route to waking up?

The pandemic rages. The Fox feeds lies to hungry-angry listeners. The brothers fight over something as silly as a mask. The map sprouts virus-red. The populace dies in the struggle.

Is this merely a chapter in the story of becoming? I guess we’ll see.

read Kerri’s blog post about SHARED FATHERHOOD. With any luck, her thoughts will be more hopeful.

this is my second run at my subject. Shared Fatherhood 2

shared fatherhood 1 & 2 ©️ 2017 david robinson

Filed under: Art, Awakening, Creativity, DR Thursday, Identity, Metaphor, Possibility, Seeing | Tagged: blue, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, fight, fox, human nature, Idealism, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lies, Oedipus, painting, pandemic, polynices and eteocles, possibility, realism, red, shared fatherhood, story. sense making, vote | 2 Comments »

Draw The Symbol [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 6, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

sketch image copy

Sometimes drawing is like free writing. I capture the lines and images as they arise without edit or evaluation. It is more akin to following than leading. It’s a meditation. I draw for the surprise of what shows up. Often, in my free flow, symbols arise and I only see them after I put down my pencil. The symbols that floated to the surface in this drawing are Heart and Strawberry.

When symbols pop up for me I make it a practice to investigate, even if they appear obvious or I think I already know. I assume that I do not know anything. It’s a way of continuing the conversation. These two, heart and strawberry, are intertwined symbols. Venus, the goddess of love. Purity and perfection. Sensuality. Eros. Happiness. Good fortune. Compassion. Joy. Charity. There are cultural lenses and religious interpretations but across all cultural variance, both symbols are rivers that lead to love in one or all of its expression.

Yaki asked me to rewrite THE CREATURES OF PROMETHEUS – a storytelling to accompany Beethoven’s symphony – so that it might speak directly to the realities of our day. He wants it to be more obviously relevant. I have been sitting on it, watching and waiting, since we seem to be living in a swirl of chaos. My grasp of relevance in the morning is obsolete by sundown. The only consistency that cuts through the mayhem is that the circles in our communal Venn Diagram no longer intersect. Not only is there no crossover, the circles no longer share the same page. We define ourselves according to our differences rather that reach toward our similarities. Romeo and Juliet is an example, a cautionary tale of what happens when the communal circles stubbornly refuse to find crossover. The children easily transcend the division. The society crushes them for daring to love. And then the adults realize they’ve sacrificed the greater for the lesser and in their grief they reach to grasp hands.

There are hearts and strawberries in every tragic tale. The tragedy arises because the characters refuse to see it. Maybe that is the theme of my rewrite? Maybe hearts and strawberries are the tender sprouts that will emerge in our nation once the fire ceases to rage?

read Kerri’s blog post about HEARTS AND STRAWBERRIES

We are still in the Facebook penalty box. It is possible that Kerri’s posts may never reappear so, if you enjoy reading Kerri’s word, consider subscribing to her blog. I know we publish waaay too much but, with the minor exception of us, ALMOST no one reads everything that we write – except for Lydia and Horatio and Malta-Alex and for their dedicated perseverance, we are most grateful.

shared fatherhood 2

*Shared Fatherhood evolved from a sketch about Polynices & Eteocles, brothers that killed each other in combat over control of the throne. Somehow I traveled from senseless war to shared fatherhood.

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Love, Metaphor, Seeing, Uncategorized | Tagged: beethoven, creatures of prometheus, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, heart, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, love, romeo and juliet, shared fatherhood, strawberry, symbol, symbols, Venus | Leave a comment »

Share Fatherhood [on DR Thursday]

Posted on June 14, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

MASTERshared fatherhood II close up copy

a morsel of Shared Fatherhood II

This is what I believe:

People write words and books.

People make distinctions, create borders, build walls.

People make rules and laws.

People make judgments and justifications.

People make agendas. People make politics.

People exploit other people.

‘God,’ like ‘love,’ is a word we use to point to something boundless. Love, like all the Gods, is beyond comprehension. That is why the two words, God and Love, are often synonymous. They point to that which cannot be defined, contained or limited.

If you hear that ‘God has written’ or that God has ‘placed boundaries’, like gender distinctions, on ‘love’ then you can be certain of one thing: someone has either confused the writings of people for the unfathomable expression of love or there is an agenda in play. Either way, the limit has nothing to do with Love or God.