Alchemy.

Plaster and stoneware. 2019.

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The alchemical process never achieved the desired goal and during the course of the 18th century alchemy progressively declined. Its work methodology "the dark by the darkest" did not match the mentality of the Enlightenment and even less with the scientific character of chemistry, which was perfected towards the end of the century. These two new spiritual forces were those that gave the final "coup de grâce" to alchemy, their decomposition had actually begun the previous century when many alchemists had already set aside the flasks and melting furnaces to devote themselves exclusively to philosophy (hermetic), it was then that the chemist separated from the airtight. The decline of alchemy meant the dissolution of the close relationship between theory and operation.

 

The hermetic vessel (Vas Hermetis), is the main symbol of alchemy, since it was the vessel where the "Opus magnum" was produced. This vessel has reached our days as the Florentine flask, a glass instrument very present in modern chemistry laboratories. As a personal tribute to alchemy as a discipline and what it symbolizes (union between theory and practice) I have extracted the mold of one of these laboratory pieces in order to reproduce its shape in ceramic containers.