Alchemische Labore. Texte, Praktiken und materielle Hinterlassenschaften

0582971 - ÚDU 2024 RIV AT eng M - Monography Chapter
Purš, Ivo
The Alchemical Laboratory in the Mirror of 16th and 17th Century Fine Art.
Alchemische Labore. Texte, Praktiken und materielle Hinterlassenschaften. Graz: Graz University Library, 2023 - (Lang, S.), s. 259-283. ISBN 978-3-903374-04-1
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA19-02080S
Institutional support: RVO:68378033
Keywords : Dutch and Flemish genre painting * alchemical laboratory * art and alchemy
OECD category: Arts, Art history
https://library-publishing.uni-graz.at/index.php/lp/catalog/book/56

During the first half of the 17th century, the depiction of the alchemist in the lab-oratory became one of the common themes in Dutch and Flemish genre painting.These depictions took different forms: some were satirical, while others showedthe alchemist with some seriousness and frequently surrounded by a melancholicatmosphere. Until the middle of the 16th century, the depiction of alchemists andtheir laboratories was primarily the subject of alchemical and other technologicaltreatises. It is important to compare various examples of the alchemical laboratory’sportrayal in fine art and scholarly works dealing with alchemy or metallurgy. I wantto draw attention to the differences in the depictions of the laboratory in both areasand the fundamental difference in the meaning of these depictions themselves. Mypremise that I would like to verify in this essay I formulate as follows: In the caseof depictions in scholarly works, the art is a means of representing a subject of lab-oratory equipment, in the case of works of genre painting, the topic of laboratoryequipment is a means of creating a picturesque work of art.
Permanent Link: https://hdl.handle.net/11104/0351005