Hilma's Swans

I recently watched the Amazon Prime version of Mr & Mrs Smith, which is very good and worth your time. The premise for the unfamiliar amongst you — two agents masquerading as a couple in order to carry out a series of FBI assignments — begins with both ‘Jane’ and ‘John’ being separately interviewed, hired, and assigned their missions. Artwork features prominently in the series, particularly Hilma af Klint’s The Swan, No. 1 (1914–15).

Hilma af Klint’s The Swan, No. 1 (1914–15) in Mrs & Mrs Smith, Prime Video, 2024.

Swedish artist and mystic Hilma af Klint (26 October 1862 – 21 October 1944) graduated from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm in 1887, and was an expert at using perspective, shadows, and composition from the age of twenty. A highly trained artist in classical drawing and painting techniques, following graduation af Klint shared a studio in the heart of Stockholm’s art scene with two other graduates, a space granted to them by the university. She used the studio to paint portraits, landscapes, and botanical drawings (she had inherited her family’s great interest for mathematics and botany), establishing her reputation as a respected naturalistic painter.

So precise was af Klint at drawing that she was soon employed by Stockholm’s Institute of Veterinary Medicine, where she illustrated a book on horse surgery which was published in 1901.

Hilma af Klint, The Swan, No. 1 (1914–15).

Swan, No. 1 was one of 24 oil on canvases paintings af Klint created between 1914 and 1915, forming part what would become her recognisable sequencing and symbolism. There is a rhythm to the work, a dance taking place between both swans, or dualities — light and dark, male and female, life and death — the opposing forces separated by a horizontal line on the canvas. The painting is part of a series, the swans giving way to a spectrum of colour, but they reunite at the end. Swans entwined once again. The work takes on further significance if you’ve seen it up close. Or watched the show.

So, this horizon line that we see here occurs over and over again in the works from this series, breaking the canvas into two sections that are pulled together, whether they’re pulled together through forms taken from real life or imagined forms.*