Hilma af Klint: A Biography by Julia Voss (2022)
Video (56:40): Scholar Julia Voss presents her new biography of Hilma af Klint, published by University of Chicago Press (2022). Video published by Watkinsbooks (2023).
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Hilma af Klint is ‘a working female artist, she was also an avowed clairvoyant and mystic. Like many of the artists at the turn of the twentieth century who developed some version of abstract painting, af Klint studied Theosophy, which holds that science, art, and religion are all reflections of an underlying life-form that can be harnessed through meditation, study, and experimentation. Well before Kandinsky, Mondrian, and Malevich declared themselves the inventors of abstraction, af Klint was working in a nonrepresentational mode, producing a powerful visual language that continues to speak to audiences today. The exhibition of her work in 2018 at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City attracted more than 600,000 visitors, making it the most-attended show in the history of the institution.’ – Amazon.com
New Biography
Hilma af Klint: A Biography
by Julia Voss (Author), Anne Posten (Translator)
Publisher: University of Chicago Press; First Edition (October 19, 2022)
Language: English
Hardcover: 424 pages
ISBN-10: 022668976X
ISBN-13: 978-0226689760
Item Weight: 2.31 pounds
Dimensions: 6 x 1.5 x 9 inches
Missing Witches Podcast tells us ‘Hilma [af Klint] broke with family and social convention by choosing to study art, she was part of the first generation of women artists allowed to attend art academies, and the women had to pay more than the men. She studied and practiced at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm from 1882 to 1887. The women weren’t welcomed, they were mocked and harassed. They weren’t allowed to study or paint nudes with their contemporaries but Hilma did it anyway. At the Academy, she met fellow artist – and one of the great creative and emotional partners of her life – Anna Cassel. (…) Channeling is a practice that supported Hilma and her community of women seekers throughout her life.
She would use her spiritual paintings when she was teaching and she made several attempts to have her works exhibited in Germany and England but did not succeed. In her old age she put a 20 year bann on all her paintings so that they were for the future, not to be exhibited in the 20 years following her death. Hilma af Klint died in 1944 but it is not until now here in the 21st century that her works have recieved the attention that they deserve.
Related Links
Transkript of the Missing Witches Podcast: Hilma af Klint + Anna Cassel – Life Is A Farce If A Person Does Not Serve Truth, by Risa (2023)