Hilma af Klint - Paintings for the Temple 1906-1915

Featured spreads are from Hilma af Klint: The Paintings for the Temple 1906–1915, the second installment in Bokförlaget Stolpe's monumental and historic seven-volume Hilma af Klint catalogue raisonné (releasing throughout the coming year before the complete, slipcased collection becomes available) and the book in this series that collects the artist's most beloved work—much of which was created mediumistically, for a future "spiralling architectural structure that would be built to house" them, according to co-editors Kurt Almqvist and Daniel Birnbaum. "The whole sequence can perhaps be understood as af Klint’s pursuit of an original 'oneness'" they write, "a basic unity which she believed existed at the world’s creation. Af Klint felt this integrity had since been lost, giving way to a world of polarities: good and evil, woman and man, matter and spirit. She saw these dichotomies as having become the principle of all life. The different series within The Paintings for the Temple individually try to reconcile these divisions—each with their own scale, aesthetic, and theme—while simultaneously revealing her many influences from the time in which she painted."