Primordial Chaos (1906–07)

Gallery 205

In January 1906, Hilma af Klint agreed to carry out the commission she had received during a séance from Amaliel, one of the spiritual guides that The Five regularly channeled, to convey the spiritual world in paintings. The works that followed are the Paintings for the Temple. She soon began work on the first group in this vast cycle, Primordial Chaos. These works address the origin of creation in ways that align with Theosophy, an emerging spiritual belief system.

Established in 1875, Theosophy seeks knowledge of a deeper reality through intuition, meditation, and other ways of transcending human consciousness. Grounded in various religions and beliefs, Theosophy found fertile ground among people who were searching for answers about the new world they were facing. Af Klint joined the Theosophical Society in 1904.

Primordial Chaos evokes the Theosophical belief in a primeval oneness at the beginning of the world, which then splintered. Because of this, life consists of the quest to reunite opposing forces like good and evil, female and male, and light and darkness.