Cornelia Carolina Amalia Cederberg, born on 6 November 1854 in Stockholm, died 21 February 1933 in Stockholm, [1] [2] was one of the members of the group De Fem (The Five), a spiritualistic group founded in 1896, and dissolved in 1907. [3]
The other members the group De Fem (The Five) were Hilma af Klint, Anna Cassel, Sigrid Hedman and Mathilda Nilsson (Cornelia Cederberg's sister). It began as an ordinary spiritualist group that received messages through a psychograph (an instrument for recording spirit writings) or a trance medium.
During group's séances spirit leaders presented themselves by name and promised to help the group's members in their spiritual training. The spirits communicating with the five women were mostly Gregor, Georg, Clemens, Ananda och Amaliel. Such leaders are common in spiritualist literature and life. Through their spiritual guidance, the group was inspired to draw automatically in pencil, a technique that was not unusual at that time. When the hand moved automatically, the conscious will did not direct the pattern that developed on the paper, and, in theory, the women thus became artistic tools for their spirit leaders. This technique, called automatism was used a decade later by the Surrealists.
In a series of sketchbooks, religious scenes, and symbols were depicted in drawings made by the group collectively. Their drawing technique developed in such a way that abstract patterns—dependent on the free movement of the hand—became visible. [4]
The group De Fem ceased to meet in 1907. Several of its members went over to collaborate with Hilma af Klint for the Paintings for the Temple.
Surrealist automatism is a method of art-making in which the artist suppresses conscious control over the making process, allowing the unconscious mind to have great sway. Early 20th-century Dadaists, such as Hans Arp, made some use of this method through chance operations. Surrealist artists, most notably André Masson, adapted to art the automatic writing method of André Breton and Philippe Soupault who composed with it Les Champs Magnétiques in 1919. The Automatic Message (1933) was one of Breton's significant theoretical works about automatism.
A séance or seance is an attempt to communicate with spirits. The word séance comes from the French word for "session", from the Old French seoir, "to sit". In French, the word's meaning is quite general: one may, for example, speak of "une séance de cinéma". In English, however, the word came to be used specifically for a meeting of people who are gathered to receive messages from ghosts or to listen to a spirit medium discourse with or relay messages from spirits. In modern English usage, participants need not be seated while engaged in a séance.
Konstfack, or University of Arts, Crafts and Design, is a university college for higher education in the area of art, crafts and design in Stockholm, Sweden.
Hilma af Klint was a Swedish artist and mystic whose paintings are considered among the first abstract works known in Western art history. A considerable body of her work predates the first purely abstract compositions by Kandinsky, Malevich and Mondrian. She belonged to a group called "The Five", comprising a circle of women inspired by Theosophy, who shared a belief in the importance of trying to contact the so-called "High Masters"—often by way of séances. Her paintings, which sometimes resemble diagrams, were a visual representation of complex spiritual ideas.
Knut Agathon Wallenberg was a Swedish banker and politician, he was also a Knight of the Order of the Seraphim. Wallenberg was Minister for Foreign Affairs 1914–1917, and member of the Riksdag's Första kammaren 1907–1919. Together with his wife, he created Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation, which is one of the main contributors to the private university Stockholm School of Economics. Wallenberg was one of the founders of the Stockholm School of Economics, and is also seen as the founder of the community of Saltsjöbaden and an associated railroad.
Daniel Birnbaum is a Swedish art curator and an art critic. Since 2019, he has been director and curator of Acute Art in London, UK.
Fanny Ingeborg Matilda Brate, née Ekbom (1861–1940) was a Swedish painter. She specialized in genre scenes, featuring families, which are often cited as the inspiration for similar works by Carl Larsson.
The spiritual church movement is an informal name for a group of loosely allied and also independent Spiritualist churches and Spiritualist denominations that have in common that they have been historically based in the African American community.
Anna Mary Howitt, Mrs Watts was an English Pre-Raphaelite painter, writer, feminist and spiritualist. Following a health crisis in 1856, she ceased exhibiting professionally and became a pioneering drawing medium. It is likely the term "automatic drawing" originated with her.
The Five may refer to:
Georgiana Houghton (1814–1884) was a British artist and spiritualist medium.
Martine Theodora Bax is a Dutch-Canadian art historian and art critic in modern art. Her specializations are the work of Piet Mondrian and the relationship between art and Western Esotericism, especially Modern Theosophy and Anthroposophy.
Major General Eric Virgin was a Swedish Air Force officer. Originally a Swedish Army officer, Virgin became commanding officer of the Svea Logistic Corps in 1926 and was appointed Inspector of the Swedish Army Service Troops the year after. In 1931 he was appointed Chief of the Air Force for the newly established Swedish Air Force. Virgin left the position as major general in 1934 to become advisor to the Emperor of Abyssinia. He left Abyssinia two days before the outbreak of the Second Italo-Ethiopian War in 1935 and back in Sweden he was placed in the Swedish Air Force reserve where he remained until 1947. Virgin died three years later.
Anna Maria Augusta Cassel was a Swedish artist. She mainly painted landscapes from Norrland, Skåne, Västmanland and around Stockholm, made in oil or in tempera.
Sigrid Elisabeth Hedman, maiden name Norman, was one of the members of the group De Fem, a spiritualist group founded in 1896 and dissolved in 1907.
Alma Constantia Arnell was a Swedish painter.
Georg Ljungström (1861–1930) was a Swedish cartographer, author, and poet.
Emma 'Mathilda' Nilsson, née Cederberg was a Swedish spiritualist from Stockholm.
Vice Admiral Erik Viktor Philip Gustafsson af Klint was a Swedish Navy naval officer. af Klint's senior commands include postings as Chief of Staff of the Coastal Fleet, head of Section 2 of the Defence Staff, Commander-in-Chief of the Coastal Fleet and commanding officer of the Naval Command East.
Spiritualist art or spirit art or mediumistic art or psychic painting is a form of art, mainly painting, influenced by spiritualism. Spiritualism influenced art, having an influence on artistic consciousness, with spiritual art having a huge impact on what became modernism and therefore art today.