Hilma af Klint is a fascinating and visionary figure in art history—although she hasn’t been included in most art history texts until recent decades.

There are many remarkable aspects regarding af Klint’s life and work. To point out a few:

• Firstly, she was working at a time where women artists were not common.

• There was inextricable link her artwork and her spiritual exploration.

• She made remarkably radical artwork, namely abstract art, well before its widespread popularity.

• Knowing that her artwork would not be appreciated or understood in her lifetime, she largely kept it private and even stipulated in her will that her over 1200 paintings be kept unseen for 20 years after her death.

A Brief Biography of Hilma af Klint

While an artist’s biography isn’t necessary to appreciate their work, it can be an interesting way to understand where they are coming from, so to speak, and the context in which they lived.

Hilma af Klint was born in Sweden in 1862. Exposed to nature at a young age, she formed a deep-seated love of the natural world early on, which would later present itself in her adult philosophies.

She formally studied painting and drawing at the Swedish Royal Academy of Arts from 1882–1887. Following her graduation, she was able to achieve some recognition for her botanical illustrations, landscapes, and portraits at this time as she worked as an artist in Stockholm.

Early Interest in Spiritualism

In 1880, before she graduated from college, she became interested in ideas of spirituality, including Buddhism, Rosicrucianism and other occult and spiritualist writings—this was, in part, sparked by the death of her younger sister Hermina. She began to experiment with art to explore both spiritual and scientific concepts.

As early as 1886, she developed a radical geometric language through practices of automatic drawing, a system that she continued to employ throughout her life. She joined the Theosophical Society in 1889 and started meeting regularly with a group of like-minded women artists in 1896. Naming themselves “The Five,” they explored art and spirituality together through many different means, including séances, which were also popular with other intellectuals and artists of the day.

Her Visionary Abstract Art

In 1906, at the age of 44, Hilma af Klint started to paint her first series of abstract paintings. These are loosely grouped together as the Paintings for the Temple—a series that she said the “higher spirits” that she connected to in her occult practices guided her to paint. In total, these highly-symbolic works include 193 paintings made from 1906–1915.

Of them, curator Tracey Bashkoff of the Guggenheim Museum exhibition of her work, Hilda af Klint: Paintings for the Future explains:

These works on canvas and on paper are far removed from the conventional landscapes and portraits that she perfected while attending the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm years earlier. Rather, they are primarily abstract, with imagery born of botanicals and other natural forms that grew more simplified and geometric with time. Their production over the course of these years represents a reality beyond the observable world. The titular temple was not one that existed anywhere in the world. She envisioned her Paintings for the Temple filling a round building, where visitors would progress upward along a spiraling path, on a spiritual journey defined by her paintings.

Interestingly in the first major US solo exhibition which was a survey of her work, many of these works found their temporary home in a round building with an upwardly spiraling path, a modern temple of art, the Guggenheim.

As far as a more formal description of her work: her visual language is bright, whimsical at times, and full of symbols, words, and letters. Colors have meanings in her work; for example, yellow stands for the female spirit and blue for the male. In fact, these sorts of dualisms and dichotomies are common in her work: in and out, up and down, good and evil. Her work transcends the physical world by using these sorts of shapes and symbols. Although playful at times, her compositions do not have purely arbitrary elements; many texts have been written solely on the symbology in her work.

The 193 Paintings for the Temple are divided into many subgroups exploring specific motifs. One series, called The Ten Largest, symbolically describes the different phases of life, from childhood to old age.

Co-chief art critic of The New York Times, Roberta Smith said,

In their wit, ebullience, multiple references and palette, The Ten Largest seem utterly contemporary, made-yesterday fresh.

But prepare for label shock: they were created in 1907.

Like the most powerful artwork, words don’t quite do af Klint’s work justice. Her abstract art begs to be seen in person, where the viewer can be in the presence of these multi-foot paintings.

Her “calling from the spirits” concluded in 1915, but she continued to make symbolic abstract art throughout the rest of her life. During the later period of her work, she references more scientific research and her deep interest in nature resurfaces—forms hinting at shells, flowers, and scientific diagrams populate her compositions.

The Powerful Legacy of Hilma af Klint

Succinctly put, Hilma af Klint was a pioneer of abstract art. One extraordinary thing about her is that she didn’t come into contact with her famous, mostly male, contemporary artists who have defined the chapters of art history books for years. Artists like Kandinsky, Mondrian, and Malevitch are often credited with early abstract works—it’s been in more recent years that Klint has been recognized for similar innovations in her own right. She is one among many women artists who art history glossed over. Now, some feel that she is the true inventor of abstract art.

As Roberta Smith wrote in The New York Times,

“The idea that a woman got there first, and with such style, is beyond thrilling. Yes, I know art is not a competition; every artist’s “there” is a different place. Abstraction is a pre-existing condition, found in all cultures. But still: af Klint’s ‘there’ seems so radical, so unlike anything else going on at the time. Her paintings definitively explode the notion of modernist abstraction as a male project.”