A random chat with a museum curator totally flipped how I see color in glass

I was at the local art museum last month, just killing time, and got talking to the curator in the glass section. I was looking at this old vase, kinda grumbling about how the blue was a bit muddy, and she just said, 'That's not a flaw, that's the story. The cobalt they could get in 1890 wasn't pure. That haze is the struggle.' It hit different because I'm always chasing perfect, clear color in my own work, you know? I spend so much on clean batch and get mad at any cloudiness. But she made me think maybe those 'imperfections' from the materials or the process are what give a piece its own fingerprint. Now I'm looking at my own color tests totally differently. Has anyone else had a moment like that, where you stopped fighting a material's character and started working with it?

2 comments

2 Comments

elizabethg5327d ago

That's a really good way to put it. I've had to learn to accept the quirks in my clay.

tylerr2926d ago

Quirks in my clay" sounds like a fancy way to say lumpy pots, @elizabethg53.