Color reproduction of a painting by Wijck from the collections of the Rijksmuseum. The alchemist, seated at his desk before the window, looks down to survey the progress of his assistant. The young boy holds up a basin…

An alchemist wearing a green robe uses a pair of bellows to control the heat of the fire beneath his crucible. Other vessels sit on the furnace at his side, and to his left a large still-head for distillation rests over…

The alchemist sits, stirring the contents of a crucible, as he carefully watches the progress of a distillation experiment. He is surrounded by alchemical apparatus, glassware, and open books. An hourglass at his side…

A half-length portrait of Friedrich Wöhler (1800–1882), a German chemist.

When Chester Fisher commissioned this copy of a painting by David Ryckaert III (1612-1661), in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels, it was long assumed that the painting depicted the famous Nicolas…

The identity of the scientist in this lithograph is not currently known. The print was created by Robert Jacob Hamerton, who was a cartoonist and illustrator from County Longford, Ireland. He later moved to London,…

A chromolithograph published in Vanity Fair of Marie and Pierre Curie and their apparatus for isolating radium chloride.

In this copy after Gerrit Dou's (also known as Gerrit Douw or Dow) popular "The School Master" composition (artist unknown), the old man at the window niche sharpens his pen while his pupils are busy at work in the…

A physician wearing the traditional physician's cap conducts a urinoscopy on the flask he holds. A woman is seated beside him, waiting for the results. In the foreground the alchemist's assistant is tending to a furnace…

This small painting on metal is a copy of Gerrit Dou's (also known as Gerrit Douw or Dow) [artist unknown] popular dentist scene in Dresden. Through the illusionistic frame of a large window, we see a dentist in a red…

This engraving shows Dutch mathematician and physicist Jean Henri van Swinden (1746–1823) demonstrating the generation of electricity to the Felix Meritis Society in Amsterdam. The Felix Meritis Society was founded in…

Originally published in Vanity Fair on January 8, 1887, this chromolithograph depicts Louis Pasteur holding two white rabbits.

A bearded alchemist wearing a fur-trimmed top coat and cap is carefully weighing ingredients with a balance. On top of his table is an exotic carpet covered with papers, a copper pitcher, and ceramic jar. Resting on a…

In this small copy in the style of David Teniers II (artist unknown), an elderly, bearded alchemist closely reads an open book with an expression of absorbed contemplation. He is seated at his desk beside a skull and…

A chromolithograph print of Dr. Thomas Stevenson (1838-1908), an English toxicologist and forensic chemist, by A.G. Witherby for Vanity Fair, November 30, 1899.

A bearded, elderly alchemist in a fur-trimmed coat leans close over a tabletop experiment. The equipment on his lab bench includes an adjustable clamp stand and an alcohol burner, contemporary to the 1800s. Small vials…

Portrait of Sir James Simpson, used as the prototype for a published illustration in the January 1894 issue of The Century Magazine, in an article about the invention of chloroform. Simpson was the first to demonstrate…

This photogravure reproduces a painting by American artist Daniel Ridgway Knight (1839-1924), who was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and also spent time in France. The photogravure was part of a massive study of…

This print reproduces a painting exhibited by A. H. Tourrier at the Royal Academy in London in 1871. The scene shows a trio of nobles standing awed before an alchemist holding out a broken crucible in his right…

Black metal (iron) U-shaped base with cylindrical brass (plated) parts; two metal slide clips mounted to slide plate; rotatable eye piece lowered or raised by the adjustment of top right knob; circular mirror underneath…

This photogravure by Gebbie & Husson Co. Ltd. reproduces Thomas Eakins' painting known as The Agnew Clinic (or The Clinic of Dr. Agnew). Eakins was commissioned by the University of Pennsylvania Medical Class of 1889 to…

An etching by Felix Jasiński after the painting by P.S. Krøyer for the Gazette des Beaux-Arts, a French art review. The etching depicts members of the committee that organized the French Art Exhibition in Copenhagen in…

Men with glass-blowing equipment inflate molten glass (background glow) to produce items of glassware. Two women are watching at lower right. This photogravure (by Goupil & Co.) was published in New York and was based…

In a stone chamber, an alchemist holds aloft a small vial to examine it against a beam of light from above. Plainly dressed in a brown robe, he stands before a table stacked with glassware, scales, and an open book. On…

This dark and eerie scene centers on the seated figure of an alchemist, pausing as he works a pair of bellows to stoke a fire. Dwarfed by his enormous chair and the looming masonry furnace at left, the alchemist peers…