Color is a perceived hue.  It is nothing more than a label that the brain uses.

Last night I couldn’t wait to open the kiln in the morning.  I had an idea of how I expected the pieces to look.  When I finally was able to open it up, I was disappointed!  I texted my friend that they were ugly.

I think the problem was that I had a preconceived idea of how everything would look.  I had never used these glazes before.

I just left the pieces in the basement and went back to bed.  A couple of hours later, I took pictures of them to send to her, and I began to think they didn’t actually look so bad.  Once again, it was a problem of expectation.  Very few things can live up to our expectations.  It’s a wonderful thing when we see something beautiful in a place or at a time when we never expected anything at all.  The wonders of life just unfold and we perceive them as they are, not how we thought they should or might be.

They are what they are.

Tonight, I have another glaze firing underway.  I am not obsessing.  I waited to see how the previous group came out before making any necessary changes in applying the glaze.  I don’t know how they will look tomorrow.  They will be what they will be, too.

Glaze is not like acrylic paint.  You can’t just apply it and know how it will look in its final form.  It’s chemistry.  By trying it out, you can get a better idea of what will happen in the heat of the kiln, but there is always that mystery.