know(ledge of the spirit

Hilma af Klint, The Swan (No. 17), 1914-15

Hilma af Klint, The Tail of the Swan, 1914

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So long as a symbol is a living thing, it is the expression for something that cannot be characterized in any other or better way. The symbol is alive only so long as it is pregnant with meaning. 

But once its meaning has been born out of it, once that expression is found which formulates the thing sought, expected, or divined even better than the hitherto accepted symbol, then the symbol is dead, i.e., it possesses only an historical significance.


—Carl Jung (1875-1961)

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Hilma af Klint’s paintings are diagrams of a spiritual plane that underlies the visual world. She was a member of a small group of women who would meet to access religious spirits with knowledge of the afterlife. 

Gregor, one of the spiritual masters she contacted during these meetings, said to her that the paintings represent “All the knowledge that is not of the senses, not of the intellect, not of the heart but is the property that exclusively belongs to the deepest aspect of your being […] the knowledge of your spirit.” 

Hilma af Klint (Swedish, 1862-1944) wanted to keep her paintings secret from the public until 20 years after her death. 

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