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Hilma af Klint (October 26, 1862 – October 21, 1944) was a Swedish artist and mystic whose paintings were amongst the first abstract art. A considerable body of her abstract work predates the first purely abstract compositions by Kandinsky. She belonged to a group called "The Five", a circle of women who shared her belief in the importance of trying to make contact with the so-called 'High Masters' - often by way of séances. Her paintings, which sometimes resemble diagrams, were a visual representation of complex spiritual ideas.

Early life

Af Klint was born on October 26, 1862 in Stockholm, Sweden, the fourth child of Captain Victor af Klint, a Swedish naval commander, and Mathilda af Klint (née Sonntag). Af Klint spent summers at her family estate called Hanmora on the island of Adelsö in Lake Mälaren. In these idyllic surroundings Hilma came into contact with nature at an early stage in her life and this deep association with natural forms was to be an inspiration in her work. From her father she adopted an interest in mathematics, and she showed an early ability in visual art.

In 1880 her younger sister Hermina died, which led her to an interest in religion and spiritualism.

She studied at the Academy of Fine Arts for five years where she learned portraiture and landscape painting. She graduated in 1887 with honors and began working in Stockholm, gaining recognition for her landscapes, botanical drawings, and portraits. 

Spiritual and philosophical ideas

Starting in 1896, af Klint met with

The project on which "The Five" were engaged involved, in 1892, recording in a book a completely new system of mystical thought in the form of messages from higher spirits.

Here she met Anna Cassel, the first of the four women with whom she later worked in "The Five" (de Fem), a group of artists who shared her ideas.

One, Gregor, spoke thus: "all the knowledge that is not of the senses, not of the intellect, not of the heart but is the property that exclusively belongs to the deepest aspect of your being...the knowledge of your spirit".^{[citation needed]}

Hilma af Klint's work ran parallel to the development of abstract art by other artists such as Mondrian, Malevich and Kandinsky who were, like af Klint, inspired by the Theosophical Movement  founded by Madame Blavatsky. Af Klint's work can be understood in the wider context of the modernist search for new forms in artistic, spiritual, political and scientific systems at the beginnings of the 20th century.^{[citation needed]}

Work

Through her work with the group "The Five" af Klint created experimental automatic drawing as early as 1896, leading her towards an inventive geometric visual language capable of conceptualising invisible forces both of the inner and outer worlds.^{[citation needed]}

Quite apart from their diagrammatic purpose the paintings have a freshness and a modern aesthetic of tentative line and hastily captured image: a segmented circle, a helix bisected and divided into a spectrum of lightly painted colors.

She continued prolifically to add to the body of work amounting to over 1,200 paintings and 100 notebooks by her death in 1944. She willed all her abstract paintings to her nephew, Erik af Klint. In her will, she requested that it should not be shown until 20 years after the end of her life, as she considered that the world was not yet ready to understand her work.

In 1970 her paintings were offered as a gift to Moderna Museet in Stockholm, which declined the donation. Thanks to the art historian Åke Fant her art was introduced to an international audience in the 1980s. He first presented her at a Nordik conference in Helsinki in 1984, and then wrote a catalog entry to the 1986 exhibition at Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The spiritual in art: abstract painting 1890-1985. organized by Maurice Tuchman. In 2005-2006 her work was shown in some major museums in the exhibition 3 x Abstraction curated by Catherine de Zegher, together with artists Agnes Martin and Emma Kunz.

The abstract paintings of Hilma af Klint are owned and managed by the Foundation Hilma af Klint.