The artisan Dao Trong Cuong was born in 1958 in Hanoi. He did a lot of different jobs before establishing the germ- stone processing enterprise. With the knowledge studied in Thailand and his creativity, he came up with the idea to make paintings from the germ stones instead of the pearls as done in Thailand. He created the timeless artworks such as the Uncle’s Ho Portrait, “Binh Minh” (the Dawn), “Ba mien” (Three regions), One Pillar Pagoda, Dong Ho paintings… In 2006 he completed 21 germ-made portraits of chiefs of state attending the APEC Summit in Hanoi. He is the father of the new painting trend in Vietnam called the germ-stone painting. Recently, he is also known as the first Vietnamese man who dared to sell most of his fortune and buy a jadeite block of 35 tones heavy, the world’s largest, for the carving of the giant jadeite Buddha statue.