Collectibles / The Desk
Rare Hilma af Klint Abstract Painting Headed to Stockholm Auction
The upcoming sale of a work deaccessioned decades ago presents a rare public transaction for the artist's highly controlled abstract catalog.
An abstract painting by Swedish artist Hilma af Klint is scheduled for auction next month, representing a rare public offering of her non-figurative work.[1] The painting, titled Ser III No. 5, will be offered by Stockholm auction house Bukowskis with an estimate of SEK6m to SEK8m (around $800,000)[1] according to The Art Newspaper.
The work has remained in the same private collection since it was acquired in 1995,[1] when the Hilma af Klint Foundation deaccessioned it, as reported by The Art Newspaper. Artnews noted that because the artist's abstract paintings almost never come to the open market, even reaching the low estimate would surpass her prior auction record.[2] The foundation tightly controls the supply of her abstract paintings, meaning previous public transactions have primarily featured her earlier, traditional landscapes or watercolours on paper.[1]
According to Bukowskis, only two abstract paintings by af Klint have ever appeared at auction, both of which sold more than three decades ago.[1] This extreme scarcity of supply has historically kept the artist's public auction records low, despite her rising prominence in major museum exhibitions globally.
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Sources
- 01
The Art Newspaper
Hilma af Klint painting could break artist's record next month in StockholmOct 20, 2026
Source passage
An abstract painting by the pioneering Swedish artist Hilma af Klint will be sold at the Stockholm auction house Bukowskis on 19 November, with an estimate of SEK6m to SEK8m (around $600,000 to $800,000). Ser III No. 5 , which measures 38.5cm by 29cm, was bought by a private collector in 1995, when it was deaccessioned by the Hilma af Klint Foundation, and has remained in the same hands ever since. The oil and graphite on canvas is dated January 1920, a time when af Klint’s was at her most productive, making 85 works in just a few months, a flurry of subtly different arrangements of triangles, circles, and rectangles punctuated with symbols and signs, including variations of the Theosophical Society’s seal. However, this spurt of hard-edged geometric abstraction came to an abrupt stop in March 1920 when af Klint took a break from painting to study Goethe’s colour theory before restarting in 1922 with looser, wet-in-wet watercolours inspired by anthroposophical artistic principles. It is highly unusual for af Klint’s work to come to auction, as her foundation (established in 1972 by her nephew and heir, Erik af Klint) tightly controls the supply of her abstract paintings. Those that do come onto the open market tend to be earlier, more traditional landscape paintings, such as Vid ankdammen , a watercolour on paper of a mother and child watching ducks from 1910, which sold for £4
- 02
Artnews
Hilma af Klint Painting Comes to Auction in Sweden - ARTnews.comOct 20, 2026
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Follow Us * Icon Link Plus Icon * Icon Link Plus Icon * Icon Link Plus Icon * Icon Link Plus Icon * Icon Link Plus Icon * Icon Link Plus Icon * News * Market * Artists * ARTnews Recommends * Top 200 Collectors * Digital Issues * ARTnews Awards * Art in America Plus Icon Click to expand the Mega Menu Menu Read Next ### Collector Libbie Mugrabi Faces New Legal Battle Over 1982 Basquiat to Satisfy $2.3 M.Judgment # In Rare Market Moment, Hilma af Klint Painting Comes to Auction in Sweden * New York’s Canada Gallery Faced Threat of Dissolution After Backer’s Lawsuits, Court Documents Show * In Rare Market Moment, Hilma af Klint Painting Comes to Auction in Sweden * Prairie, Chicago Gallery That Put Conceptualism Ahead of Commercialism, Closes After Nearly a Decade Hilma af Klint, _Ser III No. 5_, 1920.Courtesy Bukowskis A Swedish auction house will sell an abstract painting by Hilma af Klint, an artist whose work almost never comes to market. The painting, titled _Ser III No. 5_ (1920), will be sold by the Stockholm-based Bukowskis house during a November 19 sale of modern art and design objects. It has been given an estimate of $600,000–$800,000, and if it reaches even its low estimate, the work will shatter af Klint’s prior auction record. Once a relatively obscure figure within 20th-century art history, af Klint has come to be seen as a giant of her time. A hit 2018 Guggenheim M