No image yetHilma af Klint
Modern · Sweden
Hilma af Klint
1862–1944 · Abstraction, years before the men who claimed it
AbstractionSpiritualismDiagrammatic
A contested origin · 5 artists
Who actually invented abstraction
The textbook still opens with Kandinsky. This list opens in a locked Stockholm studio in 1906, and follows the line through Munich, Moscow and postwar New York — five painters who built non-objective painting and were filed under 'also present'.
No image yetGabriele Münter
Modern · Germany
Gabriele Münter
1877–1962 · Flat colour, folk form, hard edges
ExpressionismColour blocksFolk art
No image yetLyubov Popova
Modern · Russia
Lyubov Popova
1889–1924 · Painterly architectonics, then production art
ConstructivismGeometryTextiles
No image yetHelen Frankenthaler
Postwar · United States
Helen Frankenthaler
1928–2011 · Inventor of the soak-stain
Colour FieldStain paintingRaw canvas
No image yetAlma Thomas
Postwar · United States
Alma Thomas
1891–1978 · Mosaics of light from a schoolteacher's late start
ColourAbstractionRhythm