A belated post –

Some time has elapsed since my last post and the stone looks quite a bit different now. I realized that this piece of alabaster had significantly more and larger areas of the "dirt" that I had to deal with in the first two orange pieces. It became obvious that a fairly significant area of the stone was going to need to be removed to get rid of it - the stuff has no structural strength, and would not be a suitable surface long term. It's really as bad as a sand pocket.

So, instead of just getting rid of the material and leaving its cavity exposed, or trying to fill the cavity with tinted epoxy or similar filler, I decided to carve out the biggest area of it and make it a feature of the design. This doesn't always work out too well, but in this case I really like the result. I ended up having to carve completely through to the other side and then finished the edges in a manner consistent with the overall theme. Side A is nearly fully resolved, but side B is going to be more of the same, so the piece's sense of unity is far from a done deal.