Rare Hilma af Klint Canvas Could Reset Her Auction Record in Stockholm

A Hilma af Klint abstract estimated at SEK 6 million–8 million ($600,000–$800,000) goes under the hammer at Bukowskis in Stockholm on November 19 — a figure that would more than quadruple the artist's auction record if it sells within estimate.

The work is Ser III No. 5 (1920), one of a series of eight small-scale abstractions known as "Serie III," steeped in the Swedish painter's mystical visual language. The composition depicts an act of balance: light and dark through the white and black background, masculine and feminine through blue and yellow squares. A circle poised on a green triangle references the seal of the Theosophical Society.

Why is this canvas unusual?

Few of af Klint's later abstractions ever reach the market. Her foundation keeps a firm grip on her legacy, so appearances at auction are rare events. This one carries a specific art-historical weight, according to Louise Wrede, Bukowskis's head of art.

"These are also among the last ones she created on canvas," Wrede said at a preview at Bonhams in New York. "After this, she goes on to paint watercolor on paper in a more anthroposophical way."

The painting's provenance is documented. Under the stewardship of the Hilma af Klint Foundation, it appeared in the landmark 1987 exhibition "The Spiritual in Art" at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and in the first af Klint retrospective, which opened at Stockholm's Moderna Museet in 1990. It entered a private collection in 1995 and has stayed there since.

What does this change for af Klint's market?

The current record dates from 2019, when her abstract watercolor Mjältens kraft (1931) realized about $165,825 at Stockholms Auktionsverk. Even the low estimate for Ser III No. 5 sits several times above that mark. A sale within range would set a new high for the artist by a wide margin.

The market context is mixed, however. Af Klint's prices cooled after the 2019 peak, only to rebound in 2025 and 2026 through the sale of several early works. Bukowskis sold her figurative studio interior for $118,660 last year — her second-highest price at auction. In June, her portrait Girl in Folk Costume (1890) fetched about $80,090 at Stockholms Auktionsverk, her third-highest result.

Notably, all of those recent successes involve figurative work, not the abstractions on which her reputation rests. "Since the Guggenheim and Stockholm exhibitions, we have seen higher demand in the market for her earlier figurative works," Wrede said.

That demand was sparked by Moderna Museet's blockbuster "Hilma af Klint: Abstract Pioneer" in 2013 and the Guggenheim Museum's acclaimed "Paintings for the Future" in 2018 — exhibitions that renewed appreciation for her mystical oeuvre but did not, on the evidence so far, translate into comparable prices for her abstractions at auction.

Early signals

For Wrede, the omens are favorable. "We have seen a positive response," she said. That is a preview-stage claim, not a result; the estimate remains untested against bidders.

The painting will be on view at Bukowskis in Stockholm from November 12 to 17. The sale on November 19 will show whether institutional acclaim and eight-figure crowds at the Guggenheim can finally convert into a nine-fold jump for a late abstract on canvas.