Is onyx a good medium for carving?

["Tom Blatt" <tbsculpturemusic@zzzzzzzzzzz>]

Hi Tim

Your questions about onyx...I've done some onyx pieces and like it for its
beauty and colors but its not as pleasurable to work with as say marble or
alabaster. It's very brittle and although you can work it with a chisel in a
limited way it is more of the type of stone that you grind and sand to the
shape you want. Be careful because some onyx is quarried by blasting and
will have stun marks and fractures, that being said I have still done
sculptures that were quarried in that manner it just would have been better
to have a piece that is quarried in the "normal" way. If you like I'll see
if I can dig up some pictures of past work in onyx and e-mail them to you.
Where are you located that a local stone yard has onyx?

tom