As a part of the more than 2,000 gems and minerals on display in the Gem and Mineral Hall of the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, there is a small display of gem carvings as well as some fine jewelry. Some of these items are shown below.
Shown above are two jadeite vases from China.
Shown on the left is a Chinese candlestick holder from the eighteenth century made from nephrite. On the right is a Chinese covered vase from the late nineteenth century made from nephrite.
Shown above is a Chinese resonant stone from the eighteenth century made from nephrite.
Shown above is a twentieth century Chinese female figure made from nephrite (on left) and a late nineteenth century Chinese covered vase made from nephrite (on right).
Shown above is a Southwestern Indian (probably Navajo) squash blossom necklace featuring turquoise.
Writing about turquoise in the American Southwest, Nancy Fox, in her chapter on Southwestern Indian jewelry in I Am Here: Two Thousand Years of Southwest Indian Arts and Culture, reports:
“In southwestern Indian religions it has important associations, usually with sky and water, and the color often symbolizes one of the six directions (north, south, east, west, zenith, and nadir) recognized by a number of Indian groups.”
In her book North American Indian Jewelry and Adornment from Prehistory to Present, Lois Dubin writes:
“Turquoise is the central ingredient in Navajo prayer offerings for rain. A Navajo hunter provides turquoise to the deer as a sign of respect so that the deer may allow its life to be taken. Similarly, the Navajo give turquoise to each other as an expression of friendship and kinship.”
Shown above three fluorite pieces: a late eighteenth century Chinese covered vase (upper left); a Chinese covered vase from the nineteenth or twentieth century; and a late nineteenth century English compote (right).
Gem and Mineral Collections
For many private collectors, their gems and minerals are displayed as art.