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 Two Blue Horses by Franz Marc: Watercolour
Two horses stand so close together in Franz Marc’s Zwei blaue Pferde that their outlines cross near the middle of the image. The horse on the left lowers its head across the other's neck; the horse on the right turns inward. Blue strokes mark their backs and legs, while pale wash leaves much of their bodies almost the colour of the ground. Loose yellow marks hover behind and between them. The effect comes from a few decisive lines and broad areas of open space, rather than a fully described field or stable. The Artothek image archive catalogues this particular composition as a watercolour measuring 44.5 × 39.5 cm. [1]
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The horses occupy most of the upright format, but neither appears enclosed by a solid landscape. Their legs continue downward into the pale lower area, and the faint yellow strokes do not establish a firm horizon. Dark blue lines carry the strongest information: the curve of each back, the downward turn of the left head, and the near-vertical legs. Lighter washes help the bodies overlap without making them appear identical. A viewer can move from one animal to the other along the shared neck area, then follow the separate sets of legs. [1]
The legacy page calls the work “Two Blue Horses Sketch” and treats its open handling as proof that Marc made it in preparation for another painting. Artothek records the title simply as Zwei blaue Pferde, or Two Blue Horses, and does not supply a date or a preparatory purpose. A visible sense of experiment is worth discussing, but it does not establish a specific later work. The older page's proposed range of 1911–13 is therefore left out of the object description. [1]
Distinguishing a same-title work
Marc made more than one image called Two Blue Horses. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum owns a 1913 watercolour and ink sheet with that English title, accession 38.529. It measures 20 × 13.3 cm, far smaller and more narrow than the 44.5 × 39.5 cm work listed by Artothek. The museum's record identifies its own object and should not be borrowed to date or locate this one. Matching titles are especially easy to confuse when several Marc horse images circulate without catalogue numbers. [2] [1]
Artothek gives a Dreyfus private collection in Binningen for its listed watercolour and credits the photograph to Hans Hinz. Those are statements in an image archive, not confirmation that the work remains in that collection today or permission to reuse the photograph. For now the local page retains its inherited small reproduction while the exact file's provenance and rights are reviewed. The close visual reading can stand on what the image shows: two blue animals joined by a compact movement of heads and necks, with the surrounding paper left light enough to keep their encounter at the centre. [1]
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 lightly washed blue horses meet at the neck against a pale ground.
Reader Insights
Observation
Which dark lines let you distinguish the two bodies?
Comparison
How does this watercolour differ from the Guggenheim’s separate Two Blue Horses sheet?
Interpretation
What does the open ground do to the space around the horses?
Join the Conversation
Which detail changed the way you saw this work? Share a close observation or a comparison with another Marc picture.
References
- Artothek, image 11961. View source.
- Guggenheim object record. View source.
- Related artwork image, Yellow Cow: Photograph by Dr. Alexey Yakovlev; resized without crop or colour change, CC BY-SA 2.0.
- Object and image-rights note: Franz Marc, Zwei blaue Pferde / Two Blue Horses, undated watercolour, 44.5 × 39.5 cm. Artothek image 11961 lists a Dreyfus private collection in Binningen and credits the photograph to Hans Hinz. Current custody remains unverified; the original site reproduction is shown here. Object record.
- Franz Marc’s Two Blue Horses watercolour. Legacy site reproduction of the artwork discussed on this page.
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