The Swan, No. 1, 1914–1915
Hilma af Klint
Two swans face off in the first of a bold black-and-white abstract series.
A white swan and a black swan meet across a divided field of colour in Hilma af Klint's visionary abstraction. Painted around 1915 — years before abstract art was 'invented' — her mystical geometry feels astonishingly ahead of its time.
What you're looking at
Two swans, one white and one black, meet across a field split into light and dark halves, each bird set against its opposite. The geometry is exact and the paint is flat — no brushwork to look at, which is unusual for 1914. Af Klint showed almost none of this work in her lifetime and left instructions that it stay unseen for twenty years after her death.
On a Frame TV
Essentially square, which is the worst possible fit for a 16:9 panel — the clean crop would cut one swan out of a picture whose whole subject is the pair. Matted file, without question. Flat colour and hard edges make it read cleanly at any size.
- 4K master file (3840px+)
- Samsung Frame TV–ready crop
- Phone wallpaper crop
- Printable art card
Public domain · one .zip, no sign-up
More like this
Other works in the collection, starting with Hilma af Klint.
