Patterned Stones in Black & White & In Between

I saw this black and white Pegmatite rock in the National History Museum in Copenhagen, Denmark.

I thought the patterns on it were amazing and certainly worth a painting.Later I saw this wall in a high-end shop made up of what looked to be an even more gorgeous form of pegmatite.It turned out to be a ‘custom-made’ rock (as opposed to man-made or artificial), consisting of a real rock composite.I’m not sure which particular stones were used but the variety of pencil-like veined patterns in the white stone (maybe pegmatite or marble), the grey quartz-like crystal, and the shiny black stone inlays made each panel a work of art all on its own. Another stone that is prone to spectacular patterns is Jasper. Paintbrush Jasper has a range of background colours but mostly greys, ochres and earthy reds and pinks. Ocean Jasper comes in what they call an ‘orbital pattern’ with lots of colour variations of mostly sea greens and warm yellows. This white stone patterned with grey is more unusual.Detail of a necklace made of red Coral, large round Spiderweb Jasper and teardrop Agates. Agates, like Jasper are microcrystalline Quartz, but tend to be translucent, and their patterns are either banded or ‘dendritic’ like the small white one with black speckles.Grey banded Botswana Agate. These Botswana agates are very popular but I don’t actual have one because I am still learning to like grey.

Grey banded Botswana Agate by Pschemp from English Wikipedia Creative Commons.

Flint is another microcrystalline Quartz but if it is patterned  it will be similar to banded Agates. This painting I call ‘Topographical Flint’ and painting these grey and ochre stones is one of the reasons I’m focussing on grey in the series of Cee’s Challenges called ‘the way things appear’.More of Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Pattern.