Into the Mystic

Hilma af Klint: The Secret Paintings opened at the Art Gallery of New South Wales on 12 June 2021 to incredible critical acclaim and fervent public interest. The escalating Delta crisis in Sydney led to the exhibition’s premature closure after just fourteen days, but during its brief but brilliant moment in the light, artists Katy B Plummer and Nicole Barakat presented a performance-based public program entitled LET THIS MOMENT WATER YOU, that drew on their shared interests in divinatory practises. Plummer described the work as being born out of a desire to introduce af Klint’s practice to a general audience, whilst creating a “really lush and nourishing experience for people where they might put their critical, rational selves on mute and allow themselves to soak in something mysterious and lovely.” The experience asked members of the public to explore spirit drawing; cede control and submit to intuition. Participants were offered plant essences and oracle cards to respond to. Their creations were gathered and sealed in self-addressed envelopes, which they would receive in a year’s time. The artists were surprised to encounter only marginal cynicism or resistance to the method – Plummer describes a genuine openness to “the magic of the process.”

Driving her alternative spiritual inquiries, Plummer cites an uneasiness with the dominant mode of settler-colonial Christianity within Australia and its complicity in the horrors of patriarchy and imperialism. She adds that