Threats, extortion and legal fights. Much ado about Hilma af Klint

You may not have noticed, because not everyone speaks and reads Swedish, but beware: soon you may never be able to see Hilma af Klint's work in public again, as recently reported by Dagens Nyheter. According to the foundation that manages the work, you can only gain access if you are demonstrably Christian (so not Muslim or Hindu, imagine), 'strive for spiritual knowledge' or 'support Hilma af Klint's mission'. The foundation determines whether you are 'suitable'. That sounds quite sectarian.

What was Hilma's mission actually? At the end of her life, Hilma was offered the opportunity to have the work preserved in one of the most important Swedish cloisters (Christian, that is), but she refused. Hilma fiercely defended the work as being inspired by Theosophy and later Anthroposophy. Now, if there is one movement that opposed the dominance of Christianity and simultaneously is religiously inclusive by definition, it is Theosophy! The artistic work itself consists of an amalgam of religious, spiritual and pagan elements from all world religions and all times. Part of the world-wide success of the work lies in its appeal to present religious inclusivity.

Nevertheless, the chairman of the foundation, family member Erik af Klint, says that he strictly adheres to the statutes of the Foundation. According to him, the work is not art, it is a message from the spiritual world, whispered in Hilma's ear by her ‘master’ (a Theosophical concept, by the way). The work is therefore no longer lent to exhibitions because ‘if religion comes into a museum, it is dead’. That is a strange concept, because much art is related to religion, in one way or another. It is also not true that the exhibitions are halted, because the foundation's website shows 6 exhibitions this year. The barrage of popular merchandise, including the auction of 193 NFTs of the work in 2023, seems to be a blatant violation of the statutes as well. The desire to sell some of the foundation's work to maintain the collection even so.

In order to finally put a stop to this vulgar commercialism, Erik has now, after a few previous failed attempts at lower authorities, filed a lawsuit with the Stockholm Court of Justice. Either he gets out, or all other board members get out. Preferably the latter, of course.

Now Erik runs into a problem here. Several even. And he is not the only one. By statute, the board of the foundation must consist of a majority of Anthroposophists (why, that is another matter altogether). And these Anthroposophists, affiliated with the Anthroposophical Society in Järna and the Ax:son Johnson Foundation that sponsored many of the activities around Hilma, are now the victims of an actual smear campaign, threats, extortion and intrusions into buildings. People have even had to hire personal security detail. It is almost criminal. Hilma's 'master' certainly would not have whispered that into her ears. 

The chance that Erik will win the lawsuit seems small to me. A foundation has a democratic structure, not an authoritarian one according to the rules of the nobility to which Erik belongs. But apart from this administrative hassle, the current squabble does not touch on the core of a decades-long issue.

The foundation, established in 1972 on the statutes mentioned, is itself the cause of the mercantilism surrounding the work. In 1986, Hilma was presented with great fanfare in the exhibition The Spiritual in Art as the artistic discovery of the century. The foundation has therefore presented the work as art. The exhibition in the Guggenheim Museum in New York (2019) sealed Hilma's entry into the pantheon of artistic pioneers. The merchandise, generated by the foundation itself, was and still is in great demand.

But – and this is the core question – is the work really by Hilma? Over many years, I, as an art historian with a considerable international track record on thorough research, have been hammering away at the essential problems surrounding this glorification of Hilma and ‘her’ work. My first blog dates from 2013. I have written several books and scholarly essays: one on Hilma's first exhibition in 1913, an iconographical analysis of the first painting of The Ten Greatest, and on the myth of the early relationship between Hilma and Rudolf Steiner. All these publications raise the fundamental issue of attribution of works to Hilma and false interpretations of iconographical elements in the works.

In modern terms: the myth of Hilma af Klint is the result of a decades-long disinformation campaign by the foundation, which not only produced exhibitions but also research and publications – and said merchandise – that were not allowed to deviate from that myth. As a private foundation you have the right to determine your own course, but as soon as you explicitly strive to enter the public domain with its own set of rules, there are responsibilities involved. One of them is open discourse.  

To this day, it has not been established, on the basis of hard facts and according to the most elementary and common art historical research methods, which work was actually made by Hilma herself. Hilma was a member of De Fem, a collective of creative women. Among them, not in the least, Anna Cassel, Hilma’s lifelong friend, artistic partner and private sponsor. When will it be, finally, time for this elementary research to take place? The work of every artist, especially one of international stature, is and should be scrutinized through the same art historical magnifying glass. Authentication makes or breaks a work and a reputation. That also applies in this case. 

Does Erik af Klint secretly want to prevent this research by closing the collection and classifying the work as sectarian? Research costs a lot of money, there is a reputation at stake, and prestige, and wealth. Or the loss of it. The consequence of this research could be that (part of) the work is not by Hilma at all – which I expect. You see the value plummet before your eyes. Selling work as ‘a Hilma’ can result in fraudulent conduct. That is a criminal offence and an mortal sin in the art world. Removing the work from the exhibition circuit does not solve all those problems. The current call for the Swedish State to become the guarantor of the work is just as tricky when its authenticity has not been established. Another consequence is that the foundation unlawfully prevents access to work by other artists from the group, which forms part of the current, not even fully inventoried collection. That could lead to a new round of legal proceedings. 

The Hilma af Klint Foundation has a very, very big problem. As Ollie Hardy repeatedly exclaimed to Stan Laurel, "Well, here's another nice mess you've gotten me into."

Hilma Af Klint & Piet Mondriaan exhibition: integrity, myth and money

From October 7 Hilma Af Klint will gloriously return to the Kunstmuseum in The Hague. In 1986, now 37 years ago, Af Klint rose to international fame as the discovery of the century in the American travelling exhibition The Spiritual in Art: Abstract Painting 1895-1985, of which The Hague was the last venue. In 2018, Af Klint’s international acclaim as the pioneer of Swedish abstract art was sealed at the Guggenheim Museum. Af Klint’s work has acquired cultish dimensions. People swoon before her work. Researchers and critics regard themselves as channeled by the artist. 

So, nothing wrong with this new exhibition, is there? False: everything is wrong about this exhibition. Literally everything. 

The exhibition of Anna Cassel and Hilma af Klint. Stockholm 1913

In 2013 and 2017 I wrote several blogs on the art of Hilma af Klint, in which I pointed out that research had only started, and that art production can never be separated from the impulses an artist gets from his/her social surroundings: people, ideas, political circumstances, literature, work of other artists, just to name a few sources. Since that time more literature on Hilma af Klint has been published, but alas: much of my objections to the way she is pictured as the ‘lone Swedish genius of abstraction’ still stand.

It all comes down to basic research. Of primary sources. Of contemporary sources. Of contemporary literature, especially when it comes to interpretation of iconography of 'occult' art. As in all research facts need to lead the way. Facts need to be amassed from many different sources. Time-consuming, yes. Illuminating, yes. Facts can end up painting a totally different picture than what has been reported in history. It is very important, for instance, to check the information in ‘autobiographical’ reports against information from other sources, before this information solidifies into a fixed image. Do the facts correspond? If not, why not? For which reasons were facts distorted, left out, inflated?

Hilma af Klint is said to have first exhibited her ‘occult’ art in 1928 in London, at the occasion of an Anthroposophical conference. She and her art were labeled as ‘Rosicrucian’. Understandably: from 1907 the president of the Anthroposophical Society, Rudolf Steiner, had coined his Theosophy as ‘modern Rosicrucianism’. Hilma had become a true fan of Steiner. So that fits, doesn’t it? In 1932 she wrote that she was unhappy about her reception, that people didn’t understand her art and thought it best to have her work behinds lids for the next twenty years.

The 1928 exhibition however was not her first. Fifteen years earlier Hilma and her life-long friend and financial, emotional and artistic pillar-behind-the-scenes Anna Cassel were part of the exhibition organized by the European Confederation of the Theosophical Society, which was held in Stockholm in 1913. When I wrote down these facts in 1990 while researching the 1904 Theosophical exhibition which was held in Amsterdam to prepare my dissertation, I could never have envisaged that my notes would become important. But well, that is what researchers do: hoarding information for you-never-know-when.

The analysis of the Theosophical Stockholm exhibition has led to surprising discoveries. The exhibition itself had a completely different character than the previous exhibitions of the European Confederation in other European cities. The analysis of the group of artists also provides essential corrections on the work of Hilma af Klint, but not only of hers. Of Anna Cassel as well. Of the groups in which they operated. All women named in the séance notebooks of the group De Fem and other groups, of which both artists were a member, have been identified and have been given a face. All of these women are immensely meaningful for the socioeconomic, spiritual and artistic influences they had on the artists.

The 1913 exhibition functions as a starting point for a more elaborate discussion of the type of exhibited works and the consequences for the interpretation of themes; the ideological backgrounds of the work and shifts in orientation; the networks in which the artists operated and which have influenced them; and the reception history of Hilma af Klint, which has incorrectly determined and influenced the interpretation of the work and of the group.

The book can be ordered here.

New books at Bax Book Store

How influences of western esotericism in art are influenced by family networks

Art is not only the product of artistic inspiration, it is also determined by the social context of an artist. The avant-garde was ideologically determined by Western Esotericism, especially spiritualism, modern theosophy and anthroposophy. Genealogical methods uncover networks of artists, which not only run ‘vertically’ in generations, but also in ‘horizontal’ lines between families.
Text in Dutch.

Mondrian's Passions

No artist has changed the face of modern art, design and architecture more fundamentally than the Dutch painter Piet Mondrian. During his career Mondrian slowly but surely evolved from a traditional 19th century realist painter to the prime pioneer of pure abstraction.
Post-war art historians and critics have always depicted Mondrian as an odd hermit, socially shy and introverted, with a frame of thinking as rectilinear as his art and his Calvinist upbringing.
But how true to his life is this image really?
This book is about Mondrian’s true passions: how painting, the struggle with outward appearance and painterly substance, becomes the inner expression of a view on life; how writing about painting evaluates ideas and development; and the cultivation an extensive social network to reach out to the world.
Mondrian’s message can be condensed into the magical amount of seven words: Art is passion, and passion is life.
This book contains a selection of seminal essays on Mondrian, published in international exhibition catalogues and books between 1994 and 2014, in various languages.

The painting methods of Piet Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg and Bart van der Leck

De Stijl movement never was a coherent group. Analysis of the painting methods of Piet Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg and Bart van de Leck reveal why.

  

How genealogy explains Theo van Doesburg's alias

The real name of the artist Theo van Doesburg, most active propagator of the De Stijl movement, was Christian Emil Marie Küpper. How and why did this Emil Küpper decide on his alias? Genealogy has all the answers.

 

Art & Western Esotericism: from rejected knowledge to blockbuster

From 1996 onwards, Dutch art historians Marty Bax, Andréa Kroon and Audrey Wagtberg Hansen have realized various projects aimed at drawing attention to the relationship between ‘art & western esotericism’. Because our goals have largely been realized, we feel the time has come to focus on other lacunas in our knowledge of art history. This column therefore marks the end of our joint ‘lobby’ for this fascinating subject. 

Art and religion are closely related. Like the main world religions, lesser known religious currents have also provided artists with inspiration. Freemasonry, spiritualism, theosophy and anthroposophy for instance, were relevant to the development of modern art. Within the academic Study of Religions, these organisations are seen as part of western esotericism: an umbrella term for a group of related currents, which date back to the gnosis of Antiquity, the hermetic philosophy of the Renaissance and the ‘occult’ sciences (alchemy, magic, astrology).