- Artist or Maker
- Ben Gaskell
United Kingdom, London, born 1955 - Title
- Breakbox with Split Crystal
- Date Made
- 2016
- Medium
- Porfido verde antico, and rock crystal
- Dimensions
- Overall: 1 7/16 × 1 3/8 × 1 3/8 in. (3.7 × 3.5 × 3.5 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2020.102a-d
- Collecting Area
- Decorative Arts and Design
- Curatorial Notes
Extraordinarily durable and extremely difficult to shape, highly polished semi-precious hardstones are uniquely suited for creating long-lasting, lustrous works of technical virtuosity. This intricate example of Ben Gaskell’s obsession with the medium’s physical properties illuminates the delights and challenges of working such tough materials. Gaskell has been enchanted with stone carving since childhood. With ten years of experience trading rock crystal in Madagascar, he is an expert at trimming and splitting. He achieved the rock crystal's exceedingly tricky, ripple fracture by applying immense force at just the right angle. Carved and polished into a perfect cube, the crystal’s geometry contrasts with the light-catching undulations of this shockwave-like split. The green porphyry container is carved with equal attention and precision. Revealing the crystal inside, its lopped corner coincides precisely with a shift in the stone’s coloration from green to yellow. When open, the almost imperceptible hairline break that separates the box from its lid appears as if it has been ruthlessly smashed open. This dramatic detail, highlighting stone’s vulnerability to this type of breakage, was inspired by looting damage wrought to sarcophagi that would otherwise have protected their occupants for eternity.
Rosie Mills, The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation Associate Curator, Decorative Arts and Design, 2020
- Selected Bibliography
- Mills, Rosie Chambers. Eternal Medium: Seeing the World in Stone. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2023.
