In Search of Hilma af Klint, Who Upended Art History, But Left Few Traces

There is a new documentary to be released via Zeitgeist Films in 2020 called BEYOND THE VISIBLE: HILMA AF KLINT.

This is such a fascinating article, thank you!! (The NYT right now is firing on all cylinders - offering both quality and quantity, the breadth of great articles is such a pleasant surprise. )

Very interesting article. I've spent a lot of time in Sweden, but was not aware of this artist. I do have a question about your choice of how to handle the Swedish names in the article. Was it your choice or NYT editors' choice? Two things I found quite jarring: (a) Moderna Museet translates as "The Modern Museum", so adding "the" is redundant. (b) The letters a and å and ä are different, and substituting a for one of the others can quite change the meaning. Millesgården is one example, as are the island names ending in "ö" (which means "island") that you show ending in "o".

A wonderful article. I admit however not understanding Ferren as he visits that lovely pearl of a Stockholm museum the Prince Eugen Waldemarsudde writing he walked " into more spider webs and had more bugs fly into my eyes and mouth than on all other days of my life combined" - I have for years enjoyed the very well kept Waldemarsudde and its beautiful exhibitions and never ever known nor heard of such a phenomenon.

I cannot find Anywhere the meaning of af in the family's name. I am in love with her work and story and got a wonderful well printed book of her work from amazon. Has anyone ever discovered anything regarding the 'af'? thanks!

I don't know how honest to be here, but here goes: As soon as I heard about Hilma and saw the first picture--one of the Temple paintings--I flew from CA to see the Guggenheim exhibit and my friend, a famous 'energy healer' who channels high level spiritual beings (hard, maybe impossible to believe, but there it is) flew out from Australia. The paintings radiate a powerful spiritual energy and it would be hard, I think, to remain unaffected by them. Many people were weeping, for no reason they knew, other viewers stood before the paintings, staring in dumbfounded wonder at their effect, while still others were just dazzled by the mystery staring back at them. Okay, my friend began channeled Hilma, who explained some of the sacred geometry and symbolism, the deeper meaning in these fantastic pictures. A crowd gather around my friend as she in turn was explaining this to me. The pictures are even more beautiful when you decipher the symbolism and each picture has hidden depths. For instance, one of the Temple pictures has a giant cursive LOVE written across it, and this picture radiates energetic love to its viewers. I had to point it out to the docents, who were both surprised and delighted. She needs to be included among our greatest artists and these pictures deserve a permanent home.

Managed to spend two quiet week-days at the Guggenheim while this show was up. it was the perfect venue; the artist even imagined her work shown in a spiral, and the first day i was there was snowy as Stockholm. It's not very often that work is shown under such supportive and optimum circumstances, and my respect for the Guggenheim was renewed.

I spent a 9-month sabbatical in NYC doing advanced studies in Art History, so, I made a number of visits to view Hilma af Klint at the Guggenheim Museum and came away DISAPPOINTED. Here we have an artist who worked in quasi-seclusion, who rarely permitted her work to be shown anywhere, and who, before her death, did darn well everything to erase her personal footprint: AND WE ARE SUPPOSED TO GO 'OH' AND "AHH"? Sorry, Art Mavens, I was totally unimpressed. Hilma af Klint might have had a significant influence on the course and development of 20th century art, but she chose (pretty much) her own form of public avoidance which insured her contemporaries knew little if anything of her work. 75 years after her death is a little late to think that her works are going to revolutionize our way of thinking about the history of 20th art or even the development of 21st art. Her time has come -- and gone. While undoubtedly many will point out that 600,000 visitors can't be wrong, I would simply opine that the permanent collection and other possible exhibits got the short end of the stick. Frankly, her Gnostic, Masonic, and Rosicrucian pseudo-mysticism left me completely underwhelmed, as it did many people whom I saw in the galleries.

to ALB above...I agree that Steiner must have been green with envy. Her work so resonates with Steiner and yet he rejected it, it seems. There is a spiritual "force" in it---and I am not referring to the spiritualist---just the feel of her work, the intensity of "something" when you look at it. I believe that if you look at the art teaching in Waldorf Schools (Steiner schools) in America, you will find that force. Children in these schools seem to be drawn to it and then later in life abandon it because they have to live in the modern world.

Wonderful article. Surprising, though, that it didn't mention the movie "Personal Shopper" which references her work and spiritualism. It gave great context to her work, and being an abstract painter at a time when no one would understand. On a side note, Personal Shopper is a perfect movie. It has everything, imho.

Stockholm's population indeed tilted heavily female at that time, and if my pocket Swedish history is correct, a relatively large portion of those women were unmarried. So Sweden was perhaps ahead of its time in terms of female artists, musicians, etc. To a degree, it still is.

I think af Klint's contemporaries that did not embrace her work were on to something. In retrospect her early adoption of what became a dominant 20th century style of painting is remarkable. But, consider this: it seems not unlikely that right now some lonely person is laboring in obscurity in a style that will at some point in the future become the 'new thing'. There are doubtless also countless others similarly engaged whose work will never resonate with some future style, and so will disappear from history. Novelty, and anticipating what will become a trend are both important, but not as important as the actual qualities of the work produced.

Very good article. Informative and interesting and enriching. It seems as if the artist knew that someday her paintings would be recognized.

Yet another reason why I need to return to Stockholm. Thanks for this wonderful article.

I appreciate good art and am an artist myself. The paintings depicted in this article lack depth and resemble commercial illustrations. Pretty colors and geometric shapes don't guarantee good art. A good painting expresses diverse emotions and is immersive. Each viewing can reveal more expression. These paintings don't fit that description.

I saw the Guggenheim show twice. There was an energy about the work that I haven’t experienced at any other exhibit, ever. On the second visit, it was interesting to watch others interact with the work - particularly young children. They got it. Hilma af Klint was channeling from somewhere else for sure. She understood the world was not ready for her work - thus, the specifications about when the it could be made public. Simply spectacular.

Other "spiritualist" artists working in Europe at precisely the same time as Maestro af Klimt are currently featured in an exhibition at the LaM (Lille Métropole Musée d'art moderne, d'art contemporain et d'art brut) outside Lille, France. The three artists brought together - Augustin Lesage, Victor Simon and Fleury Joseph Crépin - were from the same region of north-west France. Lesage heard a voice while working in the mines that he was to become an artist. Simon ran a modest cafe, same. Crépin, a plumber, was inspired by Lesage to take up painting. Their work, particularly that of Lesage and Simon, can be astonishing, especially since none received art training of any kind. Like af Klint, they followed the dictates of voices or forces beyond them. The show is a window to a micro-community of artists essentially unknown outside their region. Great if a museum in the US could bring the show here.

I visited the Guggenheim in February to see Hilma's work. I can definitely relate to the weeping visitors described by the curator. Those gigantic canvases have a way of drawing you in. I shed a few tears as well. (And then had the pleasure of seeing the protest against the Sackler family as I was leaving, but that's neither here nor there.) Truly a memorable experience.

Nice to look at but the 19th century spiritualism blurs it.

Wow! I really like her work. It's so playful and alive. And ahead of it's time. Thank you!

I wish more of these fascinating works were included in the article.

Vaslav Nijinsky (the dancer) also left an amazing group of abstract artworks that has yet to be truly "discovered". They might be of interested to Hilma af Klint fans. Pics here https://artfoundout.blogspot.com/2016/10/vaslav-nijinsky-in-raw-vision-magazine.html An intro artical here https://scott-rothstein.squarespace.com/#/vaslav-nijinsky/

The Secret Pictures by Hilma af Klint, MoMA PS1, Queens, NY, USA. January 15 – March 12, 1989 3 x Abstraction New Methods of Drawing by Emma Kunz, Hilma af Klint, and Agnes Martin. The Drawing Center, 2005 There's history in NYC too. Interesting!

What good writing ... Thanks ...

Why oh why did you put a woman in front of the piece of art ? No matter how good the article is I find this totally bizarre !

A lovingly written article about a pure artist.

"Now celebrated as a pioneering abstract painter working years before the modernist male titans Wassily Kandinsky, Kazimir Malevich and others supposedly “invented” the concept of abstract painting, af Klint was virtually unknown until a few of her paintings were included in the 1986 exhibition..." Ahem...so although no one in the art world at the time had heard or seen any of Ms. Klimpt's paintings, how, exactly do you come to the conclusion they stole from her style book? This isn't to take away from her work. It truly is amazing; however, many people people throughout the time-frames of history have come to the same inevitable conclusions. This just happens to be one of them. Ideas travel, art is fluid.

Beautiful and inspired work. I had never heard of Hilda af Klimit but when I first saw posts of here work I noticed similarities to a member of the Theosophical Society, Charles Webster Leadbeater who lived in a similar time with a similar inspiration (16 February 1854 – 1 March 1934). I saw his work in Chennai at the Theosophical Society. He wrote a book Clairvoyance published in 1899 in London. As I read more about her here I see that shared similar belief's in the very popular Spiritualist movement of the time. Leadbeater wrote in his book, "Let a man choose a certain time every day—a time when he can rely upon being quiet and undisturbed, though preferably in the daytime rather than at night—and set himself at that time to keep his mind for a few minutes entirely free from all earthly thoughts of any kind whatever and, when that is achieved, to direct the whole force of his being towards the highest spiritual ideal that he happens to know. He will find that to gain such perfect control of thought is enormously more difficult than he supposes, but when he attains it, it cannot but be in every way most beneficial to him, and as he grows more and more able to elevate and concentrate his thought, he may gradually find that new worlds are opening before his sight.

The massive works on the first Guggenheim gallery were some of the most spectacular things that I’ve seen. Made me smile. The pictures are my screen savers. What a talent.

The Guggenheim show was magnificent. She was such a brilliant, amazing artist. I think Steiner was green with envy, and so discouraged her and refused her work for the temple. If he had been encouraging we might have seen her work much sooner. We are very lucky her nephew kept her work for us to enjoy now. Her work is moving, mysterious, gorgeous, elemental, mesmerizing, inspirational... I could go on and on. It was so wonderful to see so much work all together, to be able to immerse oneself in it. I wanted to buy the book for the show but it was not printed very well; her work did not shine. I will have to keep looking for a better book.

" ...directed her hand as she painted..." and "The pictures were painted directly through me, without any preliminary drawings and with great force." Am no believer in spiritualism (etc), but do not doubt her statement and am astounded at how some people's (hers in this case) minds work. There was clearly some component of her mind/brain that most people lack. Her thousands of hours of practice and dedication were probably a necessary - but not sufficient - condition to achieve such brilliant results.

Excellent article. I saw the Guggenheim show and it left me wanting more. This article reminds me about how one might engage further with a fascinating phenomenon. Thank you!

I saw the first photo and date and was astounded. Then I discover a female artist made them...I am just gleeful. As a former female art student I must say this body of work is marvelous. New edits for abstract modernism REQUIRED in art history text books! Sweden has always been on my travel list...

The flavor of the week, last week. Been there, done that. Great backstory, but not much else.

I saw an exhibition of Hilma af Klint's work of enormous size at Lousiana Museum of Modern art outside of Copenhagen in the summer of 2014. I had seen snippets of her art in Stockholm earlier but this felt like an explosive showing of her work. It covered all the different periods of her painting styles and also featured were her writing. What an amazing artist. Lovely article.

As a young female artist, I wish I had her to Guide me. I loved and love Kandinsky and his work has guided me. There were so few females, in that era, to look to as an example and inspiration. She is not in the art history books. Here’s to seeing this change and learn about the truly revolutionary female artists who were up against so much.

The Guggenheim show was spectacular.

Thank you for the introduction to a most interesting artist. I will be sure to follow up.

Thank you for this excellent article, and for not turning the entire thing into yet another example of "...(fill in feminist complaint)..." While biographical detail and societal context are important, for me the real and continuing story is the one you do emphasize: the phenomenon of a visionary artist (male, female, or__) with no money or connections to position or promote the work. In this case, af Klint was not in personal disarray over her non-success; her vision extended to the calm knowledge that the time for her work to be seen and known was, for her, far in the future. She accepted her circumstances and took right action, and, for that, I salute her. Marvelous!

Her work is truly amazing and beautiful. I wish I'd had a chance to see the Guggenheim exhibition. I'll make do with this very good article, and the reviews and publication that accompanied the exhibition. She really sounds like she was a fascinating artist and person.

What talent! Her show at The Guggenheim was incredible. All true art is intuitive.

Visionary.

There is an af Klint exhibition in Tel Aviv since August 6 and closes in February