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Barnebys HQ
Brahegatan 10
BOX 5038
114 37 Stockholm
All auctions / Ethnographical / Lustrous Polished Petrified Araucaria Wood with Striking...
Pietrified Wood Top Table — This lot features a sumptuous circular tabletop, a work that blends contemporary design with deep natural history. Crafted from a carefully selected assortment of fossil wood sections, the specimen comes from the Ambilobe region in Madagascar, an area renowned for the quality and beauty of its paleontological finds. Dated to the Early Triassic, about 220 million years ago, these fragments of time have been assembled and worked to create a luxury object that is as functional as it is fascinating, a tangible bridge to a prehistoric world. The surface of the top is a vibrant mosaic of shapes and colors. The eye is immediately drawn to the artistic arrangement of the transverse sections of fossil trunks, whose sizes vary, creating a dynamic visual rhythm. At the center stand larger sections, true natural medallions that proudly display their concentric growth rings. Around these, smaller fragments fill the spaces, creating a rich and complex composition. The color palette is extraordinarily varied: from ruby red and purple, derived from iron oxides, to warm ochre tones, yellows and oranges, up to shades of beige, white, and coal black. The entire composition has been embedded in a transparent, mirror-polished resin, which not only protects the material but enhances its depth, luster, and every single chromatic detail. Each fragment of this top tells a story of geological transformation. The wood predominantly belongs to the genus *Araucaria*, a type of conifer that thrived during the Mesozoic era. The process that preserved it is permineralization: after death, the trees were rapidly buried by sediments in an anoxic environment, preventing decomposition. Slowly, over millions of years, groundwater rich in minerals, mainly silica, penetrated the wood cells, replacing the organic substance molecule by molecule. This phenomenon created perfect stone replicas of the original wood structure, including the delicate growth rings that once marked the passage of the seasons. The provenance from Ambilobe, Madagascar, is no accident. This region is famous for its Triassic “fossil forests,” a time when the island was part of the Gondwana supercontinent. Recovered from this locality, the specimens are particularly valued by collectors for the intensity and variety of their colors. This artifact transcends the simple category of mineral collectible to become a piece of 'paleo-art.' It is an object destined to become the focal point of a room, whether it be a professional study, a private gallery, or a design living room. Its imposing presence and its history make it an ideal element for a modern *Wunderkammer*, a cabinet of curiosities where the marvels of nature meet human ingenuity. More than a piece of furniture, this tabletop is a time capsule, a work of art created through the collaboration between nature and man. The skilled workmanship has transformed a paleontological find into a daily-use object, allowing the beauty of a world long vanished to be admired up close. Owning such a piece means integrating into one’s space a tangible fragment of the planet’s history, a silent and colorful testament to geologic eras far in the past.
Estimate:£1,190.29
To the auctionView all items fromCatawikiorEthnographical
Estimate:
£1,190.29
OCT 17 | 10:00 PM
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