Japanese Masterpiece Bonsai Bonseki Miniature Garden Woodblock Book, 100 Prints

Chinese extraordinary natural stone "painting" with hardwood frame Sea and Mountains IV This Chinese extraordinary natural stone "painting" of a mountain range in white and gray colors is called a dream stone Shih-hua. They are cut from historic Dali marble found in the Cangshan mountains of western China. These mysterious mountains, unique in the world, are known for yielding incredible and fantastic natural landscaped works of art created over tens of millions of years from mineral inclusions that affected the process of ancient organic material which transformed into limestone and finally resulted in marble- a metamorphic hard stone. This art form is centuries of years old since the Ming dynasty. Dream stones became favored art in the west particularly since the 19th century when French collectors named them Pierres de reve. This thin marble stone "painting" is approximately 1/4" thick and is cut from a large slab of rough material revealing incredible patterns in soft white and gray colors. Its weight is surprisingly modest- easily hung with standard hardware. On occasion, private collectors would invite an artisan to inscribe a poetic description onto their more important dream stones and in this case the artists' seal mark and calligraphy translation reads: Dimensions: Frame 12 inches high and 20 inches wide. Site 7.5 inches high and 16.25 inches wide. Provenance: Private Chinese collection, Yunnan, China. History of "White and Gray" dream stone paintings...

From our recent Japanese Acquisition Travels Praised as "the crown of poets from the eastern lands." Japan, a good antique six-panel screen Byobu depicting hand painted on paper w...