Theosophy and the Society in the Public Eye

Hilma af Klint revisited. Part I – The Theosophical Society in Sweden

Marty Bax – the Netherlands

[This article is reproduced with kind permission from the author, Dr. Marty Bax. It previously appeared here: http://baxpress.blogspot.com.br/2017/05/hilma-af-klint-revisited-part-i.html The piece is not revised by Theosophy Forward’s editors]

As a researcher, I am inclined to return to subjects which have seen no satisfactory conclusion. These open ends keep nagging me and force me to revise the facts and search for new ones. Such is the case with Hilma af Klint. I wrote about her a couple of years ago, questioning some biographical facts of her life, her position within the group of The Five and her art production. Four of the women of The Five, all members of the Stockholm Lodge of the Theosophical Society, are supposed to have merely served the impressive output on esoteric art which made Hilma af Klint famous.

In this article, divided into three parts, I want to present alternative views.

As with most of my research into Theosophical artists around 1900, I start by revisiting the General Register of the Theosophical Society. The raw factual basis. This time I studied the Swedish members more extensively and in a more general sense – not in the narrow context of the five women. New information had made me more interested in the esoteric climate in which the “The Five” operated and in the events leading up to the formation of the group. 

Aquarelles by Armand Alexey Davidovich.

In this issue of Theosophy Forward in the category THE SOCIETY, you’ll find a mini-interview with Armand, who is a Russian Theosophist. His interview might not be the most detailed or longest we’ve published over the past years, but Armand is certainly an interesting friend of ours and a very talented artist.

At times art forms speak louder than words, so it is with pleasure that we can present five of Armand’s wonderful watercolors. Enjoy … !

 Alexey Davidovich Armand

Leslie Price – England

Those who work on the powers latent in man are familiar with sceptics, that well organised community who assail any positive testimony to such powers on principle. They would like to be seen as meticulous and scholarly people in contrast to, well, anyone who does not adhere to orthodox views. Recently I was reminded of a case where this was not so, as I shall explain.

In 2014, I came across a sceptical book in which H.P.B. featured, and I wrote to the author Jason Colavito as below.

Subject: madame blavatsky
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014

Dear Mr Colavito,

As associate editor of the journal Theosophical History  (www.theohistory.org ) I was naturally interested in your anthology Theosophy on Ancient Astronauts. I was surprised to read on p.x that Blavatsky material was channelled by her spirit guide. Truthfully or not, she always claimed that her Mahatmas, Brothers etc. were living men; though Olcott describes in his Old Diary Leaves what were clearly trances.

Introduction compiled by Jan Nicolaas Kind

Wonderful black and white photo of Albert Schweitzer, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1952, philosopher, musician, physician & humanitarian, 1875 – 1965

Albert Schweitzer was born on January 14, 1875, in Kaysersberg, a town near Strasbourg in Alsace, Germany (now part of France). Schweitzer has been called the greatest Christian of his time. He based his personal philosophy on a "reverence for life" and on a deep commitment to serve humanity through thought and action. For his many years of humanitarian efforts, Schweitzer was awarded the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize.

These excerpts, translated by Frank Thomas Smith, are from the book Der Andere Rudolf Steiner (The Other Rudolf Steiner); Dornach, Switzerland: Pforte Verlag, 2005).

Albert Schweitzer

From the memoirs of Albert Schweitzer (1875 – 1965):
 
“My first encounter with Rudolf Steiner took place on the occasion of a Theosophical conference in Strasbourg. If I'm not mistaken, it was in 1902 or 1903. Annie Besant, with whom I was acquainted through Strasbourg friends, introduced us.

Astrophysicists generally hold that our universe began with a Big Bang, before which nothing existed. That would make our universe a unique event in cosmic history.

Robert P. Welsh – USA

[This article originally appeared in a book called The Spiritual Image in Modern Art containing a series of articles compiled by Kathleen J. Regier published by Quest Books. All images are purely educational illustrations to an academic review of the subject].

A young Piet Mondrian

If the Devotion comprised an attempt by Mondrian to give artistic expression to an esoteric, clairvoyant experience of "astral" colors appropriate to the preliminary stages of Theosophic initiation, then the Evolution triptych transports us to more exalted realms of occult knowledge. Above all, it is the title of this composition which betrays the ''higher spheres" to which its content relates. Evolution is no less than the basic tenet in the cosmological system predicated by Mme Blavatsky and, as such, replaces the Christian story of Creation as an explanation for how the world functions. This cosmology is analogous to Hindu and other mythologies which stress a perpetual cosmic cycle of creation, death, and regeneration. It also has much in common with the Darwinian scientific theory of evolution. Darwin's only essential mistake, in Blavatsky's opinion, was to substitute matter for spirit as the motivating force in the universe. In her own world view, matter, though constituting a necessary vehicle through which the world of spirit was to be approached, clearly stands second in importance to the latter phenomenon, from which, to be sure, matter is said to have been born. The resulting concept of spirit as the active and matter as the passive force in the world is, of course, deeply rooted in a wide range of mystical tradition reaching far back into the past, as the writings of Blavatsky profusely attempt to illustrate.  More to the point, this conceptual polarity was universally accepted as a cardinal doctrine throughout the Theosophic and other intellectually related late nineteenth century spiritualist movements and also is present within the subsequent Anthroposophy of Steiner and the Christosophie of Schoenmaekers. The same polar conception pervades the art theoretical writings of Mondrian, be-ginning with his letter to Querido of 1909, and is epitomized in his Sketchbook of circa 1912-14. In the latter text he specifically alludes to the Theosophic Doctrine of Evolution as a determining factor in the history of art.  In short, Mondrian could not have chosen as the theme of his monumental triptych a doctrine which was more central to Theosophic teaching than this.