Les mondes invisibles d’Hilma af Klint, pionnière de l’abstraction, enfin révélés au Grand Palais
The article reveals the long-overlooked story of Hilma af Klint (1862–1944), the Swedish artist who created abstract paintings years before Kandinsky, Mondrian, and Malevich, yet kept her work secret until 20 years after her death. Her monumental output—1,600 abstract paintings and 124 notebooks—was first publicly shown in 1986 at the Los Angeles exhibition 'The Spiritual in Art, Abstract Painting, 1890–1985'. A 2019 retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum in New York drew 600,000 visitors, a museum record. Now, the Grand Palais in Paris presents the first-ever French exhibition of her work, focusing on her 'Paintings for the Temple' cycle (1906–1915), a series of 193 works that synthesize her spiritual quest.
This exhibition matters because it arrives amid a legal battle over af Klint's estate that could restrict future public museum showings, potentially limiting access to a select few who share her spiritual path. The show also underscores af Klint's radical reclamation of art history: a woman who, through spiritism and automatic drawing, pioneered abstraction decades before the male avant-garde. Her story challenges canonical narratives and highlights the enduring power of art driven by mystical inquiry, making this Parisian debut both a cultural milestone and a timely intervention in debates about artistic legacy and institutional access.