AMBER LEAF
This was a very colourful piece of amber I found in an antique shop in Vienna many years ago but as it was hollowed out inside I had no idea what to do with it. Moreover, I knew the colour penetrated only to a depth of about 2mm so I was going to lose most of the rich red that so appealed to me when I bought it. However, it was not a very attractive piece of material to start with so I had little to lose really.
When I had finished carving the leaf and gnarled twig it hangs from, the carving looked strangely bereft due to the hollowed out central area, so I decided to carve a group of snail's eggs in a paler, clear amber to fill in the space. The left-hand thumbnail shows them in detail, magnified about x6. A small snail forms, with the stalk, the himotoshi underneath.
The piece is just over 2" (5cm) long, the details enhanced with engraver's ink.