Chinese Stone Gongshi

Banded red, swirled, like something still deciding whether to set.

This gongshi comes from Zhejiang Province, China. It is ji xue shi, or chicken blood stone, with a hardwood base, and its age is indeterminate. Gongshi, often called spirit stones in English, were prized by Chinese scholars as natural objects that repaid long looking, each one a landscape to wander in the mind. The deep red surface carries curving bands, dark fissures and cream-white veins along both sides. It rests on a plain, flared dark base. Eleven inches high and eight wide.

It decided.