A new documentary, Beyond the Visible: Hilma af Klint, is set to open at New York City’s Metrograph on May 19, 2023. Hilma af Klint was an abstract artist before the term existed, a visionary, trailblazing figure who, inspired by spiritualism, modern science, and the riches of the natural world around her, began in 1906 to reel out a series of huge, colorful, sensual, strange works without precedent in painting. The subject of a recent smash retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum, af Klint was for years an all-but-forgotten figure in art historical discourse, before her long-delayed rediscovery.
Beyond the Visible: Hilma af Klint
Director Halina Dryschka’s dazzling, course-correcting documentary describes not only the life and craft of af Klint, but also the process of her mischaracterization and erasure by both a patriarchal narrative of artistic progress and capitalistic determination of artistic value.
Dyrschka was born in Berlin, Germany, and is active as a director and producer. After studying acting, classical singing, and film production she founded the company AMBROSIA FILM in Berlin. Her first film as a director the short film “9andahalf’s Goodbye” was shown at over 40 film festivals worldwide and has won several awards. Beyond the Visible: Hilma af Klint marks her directorial feature documentary debut and is the first and only film on the Swedish artist Hilma af Klint.
It is more than time to tell the untold heroine stories. And there are many of them. This is one.
-Dyrschka
This is a film about a truly successful life. A woman who was not dependent of the opinion of others and kept on going her very unique way of living and working. Dedicated to things that matter in everybody’s life: How do we want to live? How do we achieve a truly content and fulfilled life? And is that what we see real or do we just think it is real?
Hilma af Klint’s oeuvre goes even beyond art because she was looking for the whole picture of life. And with that she comes close to the one question: What are we doing here?
Interviewees Speaking About Hilma af Klint’s Influence
Family members and friends interviewed include Ulla af Klint – wife of Hilma‘s nephew Erik; Johan af Klint – grandnephew / Ulla af Klint‘s son; Elisabet af Klint – grandniece of af Klint / Ulla af Klint’s daughter; Marie Cassel – grandniece of Anna Cassel; and Brigitta Giertta – a descendant of Emily Giertta.
Artists interviewed include Josiah McElheny – an artist and sculptor from New York known for his work with glass blown and assemblages of glass; Monika von Rosen – an artist who runs the archive of the “Edelweißförbundet” of which af Klint was a member for a few years before she founded the group “The Five”; and Anna Laestadius Larsson – writer of the novel “Hilma: en roman om gåtan Hilma af Klint” which was published in 2017 in Sweden.
Art historians and critics interviewed about Hilma af Klint include Julia Voss – an art critic and historian from Germany; Iris Müller-Westermann – curator at the Moderna Museet Stockholm; Ernst Peter Fischer -a professor of the History of Science at Heidelberg University; Anna Maria Bernitz – an art historian who works at the Swedish Institute in Stockholm; and Eva-Lena Bengtsson – an art historian at the Royal Academy of Art Stockholm. Valeria Napoleone, a London-based and Italian-born collector who collects only works by female artists, was interviewed. And finally, gallerist Ceri Hand, who previously with the Simon Lee Gallery in London and is now director of programs at Somerset House in London, was also interviewed.
