April | 2018 | reverse threading

i have stood many a time in pier one or target, or many other retail stores, staring at a canvas print or glass-framed picture wondering if i should purchase it. the prices at pier one and target are pretty good, not to mention any additional sales and coupons. they have great buyers and often the words-only pieces or artwork speak to me. and so i vacillate (cause that’s what i do about buying stuff…ask especially linda or carol about my buying history or, of course, david.) the thing i know is – i can always return it. pier one or target won’t take it personally, and then they can put it back into the mass-produced inventory knowing someone else will buy it.

many many years ago i stood in a gallery staring at a piece of sculpture. it completely spoke to me. it is a figure bowing and was sculpted by duke kruse, the father of 20, our dear friend. i did not have any extra money at the time but this piece was wrapping itself around my heart. i wasn’t sure what to do. i ended up splurging and purchasing it. i have never looked back. this figure graces my studio and i see it every day. every day i know that duke’s hands shaped this clay, duke’s heart designed this, duke’s artistry lives on in my studio. i always always feel good looking at this, touching it, watching it grow as i grow.

although i own some mass-produced pieces and love them, with exception (like the mass-produced beautiful print i own that an artist friend of mine drew and lettered) i don’t think that physically touching a mass-produced piece connect me to a real person like The Bow does. or like the paintings in our home that david painted. or the little clay house or the beautiful vase that jay made me a few years ago. or all the pieces of The Girl and The Boy childhood art still out. not that it’s always necessary, but there’s something about real.

david’s paintings are on a big sale right now. 50% off. we want them to be in homes where they resonate with the people living there, where they will grow with the family and where they will be touched. sometimes that’s not an easy decision to make – to purchase a painting; there are always other bills or things to spend money on.

it is for this reason -even-more-budget-friendly- we are also creating products, although not mass-produced, that represent each of the days of our studio melange, our weekly assortment of cartoons, designs, photographs, paintings, words, songs….products that have secondary practical uses like mugs, cards, tote bags, throw pillows, and yes, the leggings facebook seems to want to feature with my blog posts, overriding the actual primary purpose of these posts and products- a little teeny message in your day in this chaotic world. we offer these with as much sincerity as our original pieces; we hope those of you who have ordered products can feel our good wishes.

the thing i can tell you about these real paintings, though, is how they make me feel. the brushstrokes are tactile, the color right under your fingertips, the heart obvious.

April 19, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

from a distance – earth interrupted V [dr thursday]

i was distracted when d brought the camera back to me. working on something, i glanced up and thanked him. a few moments later, i asked him how the painting he was working on was going. “i scrubbed it,” he said. “what?!” i replied. “i started something else,” he said. when he left the room, i looked at the camera. this is what i found. an extraordinary look at earth, removed from earth, from a distance away. fragmented mother planet through the haze, i found it to be a striking – and yet abstract – image, with rich, almost-metallic hues. how does he do that?

this is EARTH INTERRUPTED V: FROM A DISTANCE. we need this perspective every now and then. we lose sight. we fall prey to overwhelm in our own stuff. we are but a speck of a fragment on this earth. we are both tiny and vast. and we are capable of doing both tiny and vast things to help our earth and each other.

FROM A DISTANCE – EARTH INTERRUPTED V – DR THURSDAY – ON OUR SITE

FROM A DISTANCE – PRODUCTS ON SOCIETY6.COM/DAVIDROBINSON – CLICK HERE

read DAVID’S thoughts on this DR THURSDAY

50% OFF ALL PAINTINGS THROUGH APRIL 22

PURCHASE the ORIGINAL PAINTING

EARTH INTERRUPTED V: FROM A DISTANCE ©️ 2018 david robinson

April 18, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

these paintings.

50 % OFF ALL PAINTINGS SALE

it’s a great space – d’s studio. i’ve talked about how i spend time down there…in a rocking chair, drinking coffee or wine, watching or talking or gazing at paintings: canvas he painted long before i knew him, finished canvas that have images i watched evolve, gesso-ed canvas on an easel, canvas pinned to the wall in-the-middle-of-its-story. i love these paintings and feel fortunate to love the work of the man i love.

we both have chosen an independent route in our respective artistry. that’s not the easy choice. (think: how many people try out for american idol across this country, how many people choose to do their painting ‘on the side’ as they also day-job.) our “galleries” of work are not mediated or machinated or led or thrust forward by the work of anyone but ourselves and our generous friends, family and people who believe in us.

as i mentioned in a post yesterday, we are coming up on five years together and are offering heart opportunities. this one is to help match paintings with people who hold them in their heart, who wish to have them. sometimes, as we all know, it is hard to justify what we wish for. with this 50% sale on all of david’s gallery of paintings, we hope to make these more accessible to the people who want them. that way, you, too, can sit in a rocking chair, drink coffee or wine (or cocoa or tea) and gaze at one of these beautiful paintings.

here are a few examples of the paintings i love

April 18, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

when sled dogs dream [flawed cartoon wednesday]

life below zero has captured our attention. sheesh. we are not ‘those people’ who have to follow shows, but we find ourselves searching the channel-changer for the national geographic show or… wait-for-it-this-is-no-surprise … this is us. (so i guess, in essence, we are ‘those people’.) anyway, that’s not my point.

when david drew this, i laughed aloud. it is truly funny to think about what animals dream (like our dogdog who runs in his sleep and babycat who snores up a storm) and if their dreams distort reality, just as ours do. in the morning, over steaming mugs of coffee, we often tell each other what we remember from our dreams. talk about distorted reality! i crack up thinking about what jessie holmes (the most avid -and very-sweet-to-his-dogs sled dog guy on the show) would do if he saw this cartoon.

the last little vestige of winter is in the air here (well, maybe.) as i write, there is snow in the forecast. even though we had this amazing hike-gift the other day in sunny 65 degree temperatures, truthfully, i don’t really mind that winter hasn’t ended; it is a time of fallow and that brings great anticipation for spring and newness.

in the meanwhile, happy wintery-spring.

DREAM & WHEN SLED DOGS DREAM – PRODUCTS on Society6.com/flawedcartoon

FLAWED CARTOON WEDNESDAY – ON OUR SITE

read DAVID’S thoughts on WHEN SLED DOGS DREAM

WHEN SLED DOGS DREAM & DREAM ©️ 2016 & 2018 david robinson & kerri sherwood

April 17, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

we don’t do this alone

50% OFF ALL PAINTINGS ON DAVIDROBINSONCREATIVE.COM

David asked me what I would do with a tax refund, were we to be getting one. I answered that I would want to do something special. Go somewhere or purchase something I have wanted for our home for a long time. It’s always a piece of art or something that evokes emotion in me that pulls at my heart and my purse strings. So often I have said, “I wish…”

Individually and together we have heard those same words “I wish…” from people who have connected to one of these paintings, a piece they would cherish in their home or a space important to them. We are grateful when David’s paintings find such homes.

We are celebrating five years together soon and think this is a perfect time to pass along heart opportunities: connecting paintings to the hearts who love them. So we are offering an opportunity to you at a time that is so important to us.

We want these paintings to be with the people who wish to have them AND we need more studio space to welcome new work. In a society of sales-minded shoppers, we asked ourselves, “Why should a gallery be any different than any other business?”

So we are having a sale. A big sale. 50% off any painting on the gallery site. (through april 22. naturally, plus tax and shipping, if we are shipping the painting to you.)

Go browse. If you are already connected to a painting or your heart connects anew, email us through the contact page on his site (or call us or text us.) We will get in touch as soon as possible and work out the details with you.

Know that we appreciate you, your enthusiam, your sharing and support of the work we do. We know that we don’t do this work alone. Thank you. From our hearts.

cropped head kiss copy

April 17, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

(y)our earth [two artists tuesday]

leonard pitts jr. wrote an opinion column, a gorgeous essay on the moon that we read the other morning. only it wasn’t really about the moon. he references a short film (which we watched) by filmmakers wylie overstreet and alex gorosh called “a new view of the moon” where the two men “wandered around los angeles with a telescope…asking a cross section of passersby in a cross section of places…to put their eyes to the viewfinder and gaze upon what they’ve looked at a million times yet never seen.” the two men found that people responded in the same way, awestruck, profoundly moved by the vision. the short doesn’t feature the moon; it features the reactions of people as they gaze into the telescope. leonard calls it “a hymn to our common humanity.” a reminder that in all our differences we are the same…”we spend too much time looking down and across.” we are, yes, tiny in the vastness – something i felt myself in writing about david’s painting FROM A DISTANCE that we chose for thursday’s melange. “so each other is all we have. but then, it should be all we need,” leonard writes.

when i drew this simple graphic, i wanted to portray a uncomplicated thought. an image unadorned with fancy-ness, but, hopefully, clear…or, at the very least, thought-provoking. “your” earth with arrows upward, “your” earth with arrows that circle around, “our” earth with arrows that circle around, “earth” with arrows that circle around.

it is all a circle. what we do counts. how we help counts. how we help our earth. how we help each other.

THIS IS (Y)OUR EARTH – TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY – ON OUR SITE

THIS IS (Y)OUR EARTH – PRODUCTS ON SOCIETY6.COM/TWOARTISTS

read DAVID’S thoughts on this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

THIS IS (Y)OUR EARTH ©️ 2016 kerri sherwood & david robinson

kerrianddavid.com

April 16, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

find YOUR treasures [chicken marsala monday]

what’s that saying?…’one man’s trash is another man’s treasure’? a walk through our house shows we drew this chicken nugget from our own lives. i’ve written before, ok many times before, about the stones in our home, the sticks and feathers, the old doors and windows, re-purposed old aluminum coffee pots as canisters, old stoves still working, my dad’s workbench wooden boxes, pieces of old desks or old wooden crates as end tables. everyone has their own definition of “treasure”; for us it’s just not always the shiny new stuff.

this weekend marks another earth day, a celebration of support for our beloved home planet. more than 193 countries now mark this day as a day of awareness and honoring. as we move about our days, we make seemingly miniscule decisions about how to handle our little piece of the globe. but each one of these has an impact and the ever-widening ripples will either be adding to the protection of mother earth or contributing to the harm that will adversely effect our earth in the long-term. yes, those blue recycling bags cost a bundle, but it helps. yes, those kitchen cabinets might look old for you, but they’d look better in someone else’s home (who maybe doesn’t have cabinets) than in the dump.

maybe a few sticks or rocks placed here or there in our home reminds us of all that. they are treasures for me. they always have been. we can’t fit all our treasures into our literal ‘special box’ of memories so they sit out. i can’t tell you specifically where each of them came from anymore, but i can tell that each one is meaningful and each one comes from our good planet earth.

CHICKEN MARSALA MONDAY – ON OUR SITE

PRODUCTS LIKE THESE – ON SOCIETY6.COM/CHICKENMARSALA

read DAVID’S thoughts on this CHICKEN NUGGET

FIND YOUR TREASURES ©️ 2016 david robinson & kerri sherwood

kerrianddavid.com

April 13, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

as sure as the sun [ks friday]

www.kerrianddavid.com/the-melange

on our work table in our sunroom we have three wedding invitations. each one is beautiful, sent to us by the children of friends or relatives. it is that time, when the next generation is marrying. we are excited for each couple and celebrate with them, whether or not we can be at the event with them.

when we were choosing a piece of music for this ks friday, we decided to honor these celebrations of love-found with the song AS SURE AS THE SUN. (scroll down to listen) it is our hope that in each of these couples they are, “in for the long run, forever…safe to be who (they) are” and that, in that universe mystery of ultimately finding each other, they are loved “as sure as the sun.”

AS SURE AS THE SUN – KERRI SHERWOOD FRIDAY – ON OUR SITE

DOWNLOAD AS SURE AS THE SUN track 1 on iTUNES here

DOWNLOAD AS SURE AS THE SUN on CDBaby here

PURCHASE AS SURE AS THE SUN CD here

AS SURE AS THE SUN – LOGO PRODUCTS including home decor, wall art, leggings, electronics cases, cards

beach & bath towels

read DAVID’S thoughts on AS SURE AS THE SUN

April 12, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 1 Comment

the doorway in [dr thursday]

www.kerrianddavid.com/the-melange

david’s painting SHARED FATHERHOOD makes me weep. it is a powerful painting of two fathers tenderly and humbly holding their baby. it is love in a pure form. it makes me think of my son, The Boy. i can see him in this painting and the possibility of him choosing one day to share fatherhood.

SHARED FATHERHOOD, mixed media 39.5″ x 51″

in the very corner of this painting is the morsel i chose for today. a doorway. or is it a window? either way, it struck me as a morsel image, especially in the context of this painting.

so many figurative doorways/windows, so little time…. is it a doorway into acceptance? into inclusion? into openness? into home?

we sat this morning, over early coffee, and talked about our perception of ourselves. how we can’t see that we exhibit the very things we tout we aren’t. or, conversely, how we aren’t (in whole) the things that we tout we are. how scary is that? it’s human. we ponder and perseverate over the things we believe. and we realize in moments of self-judgement that, yet again, we have a view of ourselves that is perhaps somewhat inconsistent with who we are. that goes both ways, however. the times we believe we are not enough, we are incomplete, we don’t measure up – those times are also inconsistent with who we are.

the doorway in – to acceptance of where we are, what we have been through, where we are going – to learning more – to growing – to knowing we are held in grace – to forgiveness of others and ourselves – to trying again tomorrow – to home, a place of as much gratitude and peace we can muster and then even more – this is a doorway/window in to shared fatherhood (read: parenthood) of the world, where each of us is responsible to do our best, bring our best, try our best.

THE DOORWAY IN – DR THURSDAY (DAVID ROBINSON THURSDAY) ON OUR SITE

THE DOORWAY IN PRODUCTS: wall art, throw pillows, beach towels, leggings, cards…

read DAVID’S thoughts on THE DOORWAY IN

click here to visit DAVID’S painting – SHARED FATHERHOOD

kerrianddavid.com

April 11, 2018
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

face your giant – save the beanstalk [flawed cartoon wednesday]

when he was a kitten, i wanted to name our cat ‘jack’ but The Girl and The Boy objected. to me, he looked like a ‘jack’ in the way animals look like names, plus every ‘jack’ i could remember meeting had been a really nice guy.

and, in line with my nice-guy-jacks, this jack – the one with the ‘save the beanstalk’ picket sign – is a nice guy.

another case of little-guy-vs-big-guy, jack just wants to face his giant, save what is good, fight for that which he worked hard, keep what is his safe, preserve what is organic and part of the earth. i immediately think of the many marches across our country.

beanstalk FACE YOUR GIANT BEACH TOWEL copy

beach towels

speaking their minds, good people are making an effort to face their giants, save what is good, fight for that which they work hard, keep what is theirs safe, preserve what is organic and part of the earth.

i believe that good prevails over giants, in the long run. sometimes, the long run is waaaay long. but good prevails. and beanstalks grow and flourish.