DAVID TENIERS THE YOUNGER (1610-90), THE painter of Alchemist in His Workshop (1650), a portion of which is reproduced at right, made about 350 canvases of alchemical subjects during his long and rather specialized career. He was part of a flourishing tradition of such paintings, whose creators included such masters as Pieter Brueghel the Elder. Now the Chemical Heritage Foundation ( www.chemheritage.org ) has published Transmutations: Alchemy in Art , by Lawrence M. Principe and Lloyd DeWitt (40 pages, $25.00), a booklet that collects some of the best examples of alchemical painting and explains both the art and the science behind them. Another recent book, The Art of Chemistry: Myths, Medicines, and Materials , by Arthur Greenberg (Wiley, 345 pages, $59.95), explores how artists and scientists have depicted the principles, practitioners, and apparatus of chemistry—for purposes ranging from instruction to mysticism—from the Renaissance to the present day. Along with 180-plus pictures, Greenberg, a professor at the University of New Hampshire, gives an episodic and very idiosyncratic history of chemistry and related fields.
