About the participants

Wouter Hanegraaff is full professor of History of Hermetic Philosophy and related currents at the University of Amsterdam. He is also President of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism and a member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Professor Raphael Rosenberg is currently Director of the Art History Department at the University of Vienna. He was the curator of Turner-Hugo-Moreau: The Discovery of Abstraction (2007).

Gary Lachman is an American writer and musician, author of over a dozen books on consciousness, culture and the western esoteric tradition, including Rudolf Steiner and Swedenborg: An Introduction to his Life and Ideas.

Helmut Zander is Professor of Religious Studies in the Faculty for Catholic Theology at the Université de Fribourg, Switzerland. He is currently working on the characteristics of the development of religion in Europe from a comparative perspective.

Stephen Kern is currently a Humanities Distinguished Professor at Ohio State University, USA. His research has explored psycho-analysis, phenomenology, the body and sexuality, time and space.

Tessel Bauduin is an art and cultural historian. She obtained her PhD from the University of Amsterdam with the thesis The Occultation of Surrealism.

Dr. Victoria Ferentinou is Lecturer in Art History at the University of Ioannina, Greece. Her main research interests include surrealism with particular emphasis on women surrealists.

Christoph Wagner is Professor and Chair at the Department of Art History at the University of Regensburg as well as Dean of the Department of Philosophy, Art History, History and the Humanities.

Professor Andrei Nakov is an art historian who has published numerous theoretical studies, monographs and exhibition catalogues on the Russian avant-garde, Futurism, Dada, Constructivism, contemporary art and European abstract art.

Dr. Marty Bax is director of Bax Art Concepts & Services in Amsterdam, an independent business partner of museums, art institutes and artists. Major research interest lies in art since ca. 1850, especially in the field of Western esotericism.

Dr. Marco Pasi is Associate Professor in the History of Hermetic Philosophy and related currents at the University of Amsterdam. He has written extensively on the history of modern Western esotericism.

David Lomas is Professor of Art History at the University of Manchester. He directs the Centre for the Study of Surrealism and Its Legacies. His publications on Surrealism include The Haunted Self and Simulating the Marvellous.

Dr. Iris Müller-Westermann is Curator of International Art at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm. Her doctoral thesis dealt with Edvard Munch. She has curated the exhibition Hilma af Klint – A Pioneer of Abstraction.

Briony Fer is Professor of History of Art at University College, London. She has published extensively on 20th century and contemporary art.

Thierry de Duve is a Belgian professor of modern art theory and contemporary art theory, and he both actively teaches and publishes books in the field. He is an art critic and also curates exhibitions.

Daniel Birnbaum has been the Director of Moderna Museet since autumn 2010. Between the years 2000-2010 he was the rector of Städelschule in Frankfurt and director of the Kunsthalle Portikus.

Louise Belfrage is Project Leader and International Advisor at Axel and Margaret Ax:son Johnson Foundation for public benefit.

Mark Isitt is a Swedish journalist, specializing in architecture and design, writing for Dagens Nyheter and Göteborgs-Posten.