FIBER Festival

Thijs Hagendijk researches the close connection between alchemy and the arts in early modern Europe.

In the early modernity, alchemy and the arts were closely connected. Artistic experiments spawned scientific discoveries and many early modern experiments in artisinal techniques are now seen as art. Researcher Thijs Hagendijk shows that this distinction was only formed later. Alchemy was seen just as any other other art form as a way of imitating and even improving nature.

Thijs Hagendijk graduated in 2015 in History and Philosophy of Science at Utrecht University. For his thesis, he studied the discovery of osmos in the early nineteenth century. Currently he is part of research project ARTECHNE, researching alchemist manuscripts and the transmission of artisanal techniques in early modern Europe.