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.

I spent the day glazing pots, and only took a break to perform a wedding. I can’t wait to see how these come out. The liquid glazes look so different from how they will be after firing. 

Colors!  I used lots of colors.

Tomorrow I will be able to sit with them and meander through the brush strokes, seeing what story they might tell me. 

I hope they will have distinct color shapes, and not just melt together. That’s what makes it so interesting and exciting. I only used one or two glazes that I have worked with before. 

This is about half of the pieces. 

Part of me wants to glaze the rest tonight, but I really want to see how these come out first. 

I often talk about gripping the moving pen. I can’t force the words to flow out.  Lately I’ve been wanting to write, but then nothing happens. Instead, I’ve been creating pieces in clay, or painting on paper and canvas. 

About a week ago, I cut up a minnow and dropped it into the aquarium.  We have certain fish that like live food, or at least very fresh food. Right now I can’t find any worms.

One little fish tried to swallow a chunk that was too big, and he couldn’t close his mouth afterwards. He looked uncomfortable.  His mouth wouldn’t close. The next day, he still swam around with his mouth wide open. On the third day, he really seemed to be in distress. He just hovered there in the flow from the filter, swimming in a kind of jerky way, and his gills appeared swollen. I’d been thinking of intervening, and now I knew I had to. 

I netted him, which was easy, and held him in a gloved hand while I removed the offending piece of minnow with tweezers.

When I put him back into the water, his mouth was still open, and his gills were still enlarged. That was two days ago. He looks just fine now, and whenever I approach the aquarium he comes as close as he can to me.  I pretend he knows that I saved his life. 

I’m excited to open my kiln tomorrow, and find out what survived the bisque firing. My plan is to paint abstract paintings in stoneware glaze, kind of like I do with acrylic paint on canvas. 

I’ve been thinking about this for quite a while, and it’s kind of a long process. 

The pots have smooth surfaces for painting on, and I have all these new glazes I have never tried. This is a departure for me because up until now I’ve used mostly browns, inspired by early New England redware. 

I’ve been an affiliate member of the local artists league for a year or so, and now I’m joining for real. I intend to participate in their 100 Day Project. I create something pretty much every day, and it’s helpful to have a focus. 

I’m excited to connect with other artists and talk about our work. 

Creative expression automatically reflects your personality and events from your life. Your body makes the marks.  Your body that lives the life and remembers the experiences, creates the art in response. You can’t disconnect yourself from it.  You can’t separate yourself from your brain or your hand, and you can’t disassociate from the product, either. Just as you are connected to the fingerprints you leave behind so casually, so effortlessly. You are recorded in the composition. 

The way to expand your creative mind and abilities is to do something creative.  I think it’s very useful to learn to use your medium of choice, but I think it’s more important to develop your confidence.  You don’t need expensive art supplies.  You don’t have to use all of the supplies properly.  You can draw on the wall of a cave with a stick from the fire.  The urge will turn to passion as you become comfortable with your artistic voice.