A major exhibition at Paris's Grand Palais presents Hilma af Klint's visionary abstract series "Paintings for the Temple" (1906–1915) for the first time in France. The show features works like "The Ten Largest" (1907), which predate the abstract art of Kandinsky, Mondrian, and Malevich by several years. Curated by Pascal Rousseau, the exhibition highlights Af Klint's pioneering use of spirals, geometric forms, and spiritual themes, created in seclusion and long hidden from public view.
This exhibition matters because it corrects art history's long-standing omission of Af Klint as a true pioneer of abstraction, challenging the male-dominated narrative that credited others with the movement's invention. By bringing her monumental works to a major Parisian institution, the show introduces French audiences to an artist whose radical, spiritually driven practice was decades ahead of its time, reshaping how we understand the origins of modern abstract art.