Sweden is known for its design, architecture, industry and technology, but there are other aspects connected with mysticism, spiritualism and esoteric speculations that aren't often explored.
An exhibition entitled "Swedish Ecstasy: From Swedenborg to Hilma af Klint and beyond", kicking off next month at Bozar in Brussels (from February 17 through May 21, 2023) is set to put emphasis on these themes through the writings of Emanuel Swedenborg and August Strindberg, and the visual art of C.F. Hill, Ernst Josephson and Hilma af Klint, among the others.
In the last decade or so Hilma af Klint (1862-1944), a painter influenced by contemporary spiritual movements, including spiritualism, theosophy and, later, anthroposophy, has been widely rediscovered through dedicated exhibitions. Her colourful abstractions also inspired fashion and textile projects, including Acne's S/S 14 capsule and the palette for a yarn collection. Hilma af Klint believed that a higher consciousness was speaking through her and was guiding her hand while she painted. "The pictures were painted directly through me," she wrote, "without any preliminary drawings and with great force. I had no idea what the paintings were supposed to depict; nevertheless, I worked swiftly and surely, without changing a single brushstroke."
Her modus operandi was also used by the women behind The Five: af Klint was indeed surrounded by less known female artists who explored otherworldly inspirations and the occult, including Anna Cassel, Sigrid Hedman and sisters Mathilda Nilsson and Cornelia Cederberg, a group interested in accessing the spiritual realms through meditation and séances. Active between 1896 and 1908, the group communicated with spiritual beings and recorded messages from higher spirits referred to as The High Masters, with whom they communicated in trance-like states through intermediaries, mystic spirits named Amaliel, Ananda and Gregor, transcribing their messages via automatic texts and drawings (there is enough in their story to inspire a film or even an entire series suspended between art and occultism...).
Through such practices, The Five, and in particular af Klint, liberated themselves from the constraints of formal training to create something new, exciting and mysterious, as proved by the sketches included in the exhibition.
The event at Bozar will feature groups of works by Strindberg, Hill, Josephson, af Klint, Cassel and The Five, plus works by artists inspired by Swedenborg, including William Blake, and an additional section with works by contemporary artists such as Carsten Höller, Christine Ödlund, Daniel Youssef, Cecilia Edefalk and Lars Olof Loeld.
"Swedish Ecstasy" will be completed by two ambitious projects, the first is a reconstruction of Swedenborg's sketch of a futuristic flying machine. The second is a VR and AR experience of Hilma af Klint's temple: the artist created the series of 193 works of the Paintings for the Temple between 1906 and 1915.
The paintings represent Hilma af Klint's vision of a spiral-shaped building characterised by an inventive geometric visual language - spirals, circles and petal-like forms - rich of symbolisms. The temple was conceived like a museum large enough to show her most important works, but also like a spiritual entity or an inner temple and these paintings are considered as the artist's most important body of work.
The VR experience is the result of a collaboration between the Hilma af Klint Foundation and digital London-based laboratory Acute Art. The VR version of af Klint's Temple was launched during Frieze London last October and is currently travelling to leading museums internationally. In this way, Klint's museum can finally be enjoyed by thousands of people worldwide at the same time.
Ths is not the most technological development of "The Paintings for the Temple": last November the paintings already received the NFT treatment by Acute Art in collaboration with Stolpe Publishing, minted in an edition of two, one non-commercial set remained with the publishing house, another set was sold on the GODA (Gallery of Digital Assets) platform.
Image credits for this post
Daniel Youssef, Neon writing "Swedish Ecstasy", 2022. Courtesy of the artist
Hilma af Klint, Altarpiece, Group X, No. 1, 1915. Courtesy of the Hilma af Klint Foundation. Photo: Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
The Five, Spiritualistic drawing, 1908. Courtesy of the Hilma af Klint Foundation. Photo: Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
August Strindberg, Wonderland, Sign, 1894. Nationalmuseum, Stockholm. Copyright Erik Cornelius / Nationalmuseum 2008
Swedenborg's flying machine, from Diarii Spiritualis, 1843, Swedenborg House, London.
Hilma af Klint, Altarpiece, Group X, No. 2, 1915. Courtesy of the Hilma af Klint Foundation. Photo: Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
Hilma af Klint, Altarpiece, Group X, No. 3, 1915. Courtesy of the Hilma af Klint Foundation. Photo: Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
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