Alchemy

“Alchemical Room”, pigments, shellac and egg tempera, cm. 100 x 110 - 1979/80 Alchemico

The roots of alchemical practices lie in ancient Greek Orphic rites, Egyptian magic, Gnostic mysticism, and Hermetic literature. It also combines ancient Arabic practices with the texts of Hermes Trismegistus and Geber (Giābir ibn Hayyān), the beginnings of experimental science with elements of mysticism, and a new symbolic alphabet. The highest aspiration of alchemy was to extract from primordial matter, through various stages of purification, the philosopher's stone, a very pure substance that by simple contact could obtain gold and silver—metals of the sun and moon—from common metals, heal the human body, distill a universal medicine, and reach the quintessence of nature. Alchemy is ultimately the art of self-transmutation. The alchemical works of Vizzini are moments of meditation, works that must be observed in silence, no meaning must be sought, the true meaning is what each person perceives, something that is not inexplicable, nor describable...