Rare Find

Impressive wall display of two (2) Chinese 19th century Dream Stone “Landscape Paintings” with original period frames These wonderful
round natural Stones depict dark green colored mountains and perhaps a river bed or meandering cloud above.

Dimensions: frames measure 25 inches high and 20 inches wide. Round Dream stones are 12 inches diameter.

Qing dynasty, late 19th century

Provenance: private Chinese collection originally found in Suzhou, China 2004.

History of China’s extraordinary natural stone paintings:

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 inch thick and is cut from a large slab of rough material revealing incredible patterns in soft white and gray colors. After cutting, a thin coating of wax is carefully applied to its surface to protect and reveal its beautiful subtle colors and often each painting is signed with a poetic verse and seal of an artisan who describes its majestic beauty.The weight of each frame 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:Beautiful Land of long sides of Mountains. To find examples possessing clear, contrasting detail like these is indeed a rare find. Fine stone paintings like these examples are rare as access to and availability of resource material diminishes and old antique examples like this exceptional set of sixteen are hard to find now.

Reference: Dreaming of Dreamstones China’s Extraordinary Natural Stone Paintings, Schneible Fine Arts. Dreaming of Dreamstones – World’s first comprehensive English text publication covers China’s extraordinary natural Stone Paintings, by author and dream stone lecturer Douglas Schneible, 35 pages, softcover, ISBN 978-0-578. See photos.

Lifetime guarantee of authenticity:
All of our Asian works of art come with our Lifetime Authenticity Guarantee.

We have been dealing in authentic Chinese natural stone paintings, Japanese antique garden ornaments, lanterns and water basins for many years. Our president personally travels to China and Japan each year to meet his network partners who assist him in finding best examples. He personally inspects each work of art to ensure its old age, authenticity and quality condition. After accumulating a group, they are imported to Vermont and Maine in large containers. This method keeps shipping costs low and enables us to offer them to you at reasonable prices. We carefully pack and ship to clients all-over the USA and at reasonable shipping costs.