by Tom Gurney
Tom Gurney BSc (Hons) is an art history expert with over 20 years experience
Published on June 19, 2020 / Updated on October 17, 2026
Email: tomgurney1@gmail.com / Phone: +44 7429 011000
Looking at Red and Blue Horse
Two horses lower their heads within a jagged landscape. One is warm red, the other deep blue; their bodies are separate, yet the slopes and dark lines around them bind the pair into one compact design. Franz Marc made Red and Blue Horse (Rotes und blaues Pferd) in 1912. The Lenbachhaus holds it as GMS 706. Its collection record calls the work tempera, watercolour and pencil on paper mounted on card, rather than an oil painting. [1]
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Watch on YouTubeAnimals inside a fractured landscape
At 35.7 × 45.7 cm, this is a relatively small work on paper. Marc sets the red horse to the left and the blue one lower at the right. Angular green, yellow and grey forms interrupt any easy division between animal and setting. The lowered heads give both creatures a stillness that contrasts with the sharp landscape. The museum's account sees the increasingly crystalline forms of Marc's 1912 animal images as a way of moving beyond natural description. Its colour reading is an interpretation of this particular work, not a fixed dictionary that makes every Marc red or blue mean the same thing. [1]
The Lenbachhaus records Marc's signature in tempera at the lower left and the picture's 1957 gift through the Gabriele Münter Foundation. Those details distinguish this sheet from similarly named horse paintings and postcards. A 1913 postcard to Kandinsky also uses bold horse colour but is a separate illustrated message with its own date and collection number. The named objects should be compared rather than merged because their subjects sound alike. [1] [2]
Follow the horses' bowed necks and then the broad diagonals around them. The work asks whether a calm animal pose can remain calm when the whole landscape seems split into planes. Its answer is visual: the horses hold their places, while the colour and shapes keep the page in motion.
Artwork Directory
This source-checked selection contains 192 identified works and print designs from the current Franz Marc research set. It is a curated selection, not a complete catalogue raisonné. Some works link to their article here; others link to a collection record. Unresolved identifications are omitted.
Discussion
Two differently coloured horses lower their heads in one compact design.
Reader Insights
Observation
Which slope or line binds the pair together?
Comparison
How does this work on paper differ from Large Blue Horses?
Interpretation
What happens when the contrasting colours share one pose?
Join the Conversation
Which detail changed the way you saw this work? Share a close observation or a comparison with another Marc picture.
References
- Lenbachhaus, Rotes und blaues Pferd. View source.
- Lenbachhaus, GMS 742. View source.
- Related artwork image, Yellow Cow: Photograph by Dr. Alexey Yakovlev; resized without crop or colour change, CC BY-SA 2.0.
- Splash image: Franz Marc, Red and Blue Horse, 1912, tempera, watercolour and pencil on paper mounted on card. Lenbachhaus, Munich, GMS 706. Image CC0 1.0. Object record.
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