Nude Lying in the Flowers

A true visionary of his day, Franz Marc produced canvases that brim and overflow with color and compositional tension. Although he painted mainly animals and scenes of nature, he portrayed them in a hyper intense style seemingly at odds with the tranquil subject matter – spiritually charged colors, violent twists and turns, and a pervasive intensity and charged atmosphere. Element of this style were also characteristic of many of his peers - Wassily Kandinsky, August Macke, and Lyonel Feininger – with whom he co-founded the seminal Der Blaue Reiter group, an artist collective that staged some of the first truly modern 20th century exhibits. Sadly, his life was cut tragically short, when at the age of 36 he was killed at the frontlines of WWI before his reassignment letters could reach him; but his passion and artistry live on in his unique body of work.