Throughout the mid- and late-19th century in Europe and the United States, spiritualism—the belief that the living can communicate with the dead—gained popularity. In a time when many scientific discoveries were revealing previously undetected forces and new technologies were enabling long-distance communication, the idea of contacting people who had passed away seemed possible to a wide swath of the public.
Af Klint began taking part in Spiritualist seances in 1879, when she was still a teenager. The death of her sister in 1880 sparked a deeper interest in this practice. She would continue taking part in séances for much of her life, but by the 1890s, her focus turned to contacting higher spirits acting as a medium herself.
The latter half of the 19th century gave rise to other new forms of spiritual engagement as well. In 1875 in New York, Helena Blavatsky (b. 1831; d. 1891), an occultist and medium, cofounded a new esoteric spiritual movement called Theosophy, which borrowed aspects of European philosophies, like Neoplatonism, and Eastern religions, like Buddhism and Hinduism. According to the Theosophical movement, “the individual is a ‘microcosmos,’ a small universe that bears a significant analogy with the vast universe of the ‘Macrocosmos’.”
In 1904, Hilma af Klint joined the Theosophical Society’s Federation in Sweden. She soon became particularly interested in Rudolf Steiner’s (b. 1861; d. 1925) doctrines. Steiner was the leader of the Theosophical Society in Germany, but he would later break with the group and establish Anthroposophy, which has an increased focus on human domains and is more aligned with Christian thought. Af Klint joined the Anthroposophical society in 1920. Theosophy, and later Anthroposophy, would inform much of af Klint’s unique spiritual belief system, which was integrally linked with much of her artistic practice.
Tree of Knowledge, The W Series, No. 1, 1913
Watercolor, gouache, graphite, and ink on paper
45.7 x 29.5 cm
Courtesy The Hilma af Klint Foundation, Stockholm, HaK 133
©The Hilma af Klint Foundation, Bilbao 2024