Stone, an abundantly available and naturally occurring material, has multitudes of uses in the arts. Most commonly, stones of many types are carved into sculptures, varying from miniature to monumental. Types of stone that are popular for sculpture include marble, sandstone, limestone, and alabaster. Carving stone is a reductive process: the artist begins with a large piece and chips away at it, using a chisel and hammer or a power tool like a dremel, to reveal the sculpture inside. Stone sculpture dates back to prehistoric times, with examples like displays of petroglyphs found across North America or the tiny limestone Venus of Willendorf (ca. 30,000 BCE) showing the ingenuity of early humans. Contemporary artists who use stone are often drawn to the indelibility of the material. Jenny Holzer, best known for her text-based works, makes her large installations of benches out of polished stone. Carved into this hard, unwavering surface, her words take on a sense of gravity and permanence. Some land artists use stones in their raw, unchanged sculptural forms. Richard Long’s sculptures have a distinctive sense of place; he gathers stones from a particular area and artfully arranges them in the gallery. Andy Goldsworthy makes stone sculptures for both interior and exterior spaces.

Stone can also be used in lithography, a type of printmaking. At the end of the eighteenth century, a Bavarian artist discovered a particular type of limestone that had properties that allowed it to retain marks made with a grease-based medium. To create a lithograph, the artist draws or paints an image on the stone, then treats the surface of the stone with acid and gum arabic. The image may then be printed many times, and the stone may be ground in order to make a new image. The finely grained surface of the limestone lends a soft texture to the appearance of the final print. Stone lithography is still practiced by artists such as John Armleder, Elizabeth Murray, and Terry Winters, among others.