Renato Bittoni was an art student who submitted four designs for an open call exhibition at the Opificio delle Pietre Dure in Florence in 1953. This design called ‘Valchirie’, showing two figures on horseback, was accepted for the exhibition and realised in stone by the makers at the Opificio workshop in 1954. The mauve sky is formed of one piece of lilla viola with branching dendritic forms that evoke a brooding horizon against the paesina ground and gabbro rock formations. The natural markings of the stone were incorporated into Bittoni’s initial design, indicating that the artist had conceived the panel based on pre-selected stones. This marks a reversal of the traditional process where the stone selection was outsourced to the manufacture stage in the workshop. The starkly lit, abstracted figures of the scene respond to the taste of new American patrons for stone art works who favoured the styles of surrealist artists such as Giorgio de Chiricio (1888-1978).

Sir Arthur Gilbert and his wife Rosalinde formed one of the world's great decorative art collections, including silver, mosaics, enamelled portrait miniatures and gold boxes. Arthur Gilbert donated his extraordinary collection to Britain in 1996.