Fertile Retort

2020

Blown glass, 7”x 18” x 5”

Recreation of an alchemical retort used for distillation, based off of 2nd. C CE designs by Maria the Prophetess. Part of a research project on the gendered origins of the earliest recorded alchemical glass. The retort, a sort of bladder distillation chamber, was reinterpreted in Islamic and European medieval and Renaissance laboratory alchemy as a process of material transformation and purification.

Gaffer: Angus Powers