Into Drakes Bay, Point Reyes
, painting by Rob Robinson.
Rob climbed up a steep bluff to capture the vista from
Point Reyes Lighthouse into Drakes Bay in Northern
California. “It was on the edge, but a thrilling place
to paint.”
tical, very sensible. He was also very genuine—just
a jewel. I think about him every day.”
He met his future wife, Margaret “Peggy”
Brooks, while studying at the Santa Barbara College
of the University of California campus on the Riv-
iera. Frank and Peggy were living on a boat in the
Santa Barbara Harbor when their first child, Rob,
arrived in 1950. A year later, they moved up to the
Mountain Drive community, a bohemian enclave
for artistic, creative types in the hills of Montecito.
Here they built their own home and raised Rob and
four more children: Maia, Tamar, Rima and Louis.
Rob thrived in this close-knit community envi-
ronment, spending much of his childhood build-
ing forts in trees and underground, and foraging
the canyons and mountains alongside their home.
“Growing up, everyone helped build each other’s
houses, walls, pools—whatever we needed. We were
always welcome in everyone’s homes. Lots of artists
and teachers lived there, and arts were a part of the
culture. We walked to Cold Spring School and con-
nected with the natural world along the way.”
Rob’s sister Maia says, “As children, we were
surrounded by the earth, the chaparral and the
oaks. We built our house with adobe bricks that we
made from the soil on our property.”
Frank Robinson nurtured his children’s design
and building skills by including them in projects.
“Our father took us to his jobs on occasion, and
we earned a little bit of cash picking up nails and
doing general job cleanup,” recalls Maia. “We all
learned perspective and balance through his design
renderings. He designed two of the homes that my
husband and I built and helped Rob to design three
homes that he built on Mountain Drive.”
Rob says his father also taught him a valu-
able lesson that has served him well throughout
his life. “When there was something you had to
do or wanted to do, he would say ‘make a decision
you’re going to do it, and then make it happen.’”
Rob vividly recalls a time when he was about ten
years old and his father gave him the chore of
chopping a large pile of wood. “I’ll do my best,”
said young Rob, to which Frank replied, “No,
you don’t understand, this isn’t about doing your
best, it’s about getting it done.” Rob says he didn’t
understand the sage advice at the time. “In fact,
I was somewhat perplexed, but later realized the
strength and results gained in sincerely commit-
ting to something.”
Sister Maia says, “I think the people in Rob’s
life and the physical environment he was raised
in are a big part of the basis for his paintings and
for the emotion that comes through in his work.
Mountain Drive was pretty much uncharted terri-
tory when we were kids, as far as a place to live, and
it could be very rough but also very freeing, with
lots of room to create your own space.”
Maia adds that their mother, Peggy, also influ-
enced their connections with the arts and nature.
“Our mother gave us our love of music and plant
life. She was a botanist and was endlessly curi-
ous about all of our native plants. We spent many
hours hiking the trails and blazing new ones in the
hills above Santa Barbara. It fostered an intimate
knowledge of the area.”
54
Montecito Magazine
Spring/Summer 2017