Spring Expressionism

Spring is in the air, and for some reason, the nice weather today reminded me of one of my favorite paintings. Franz Marc's The Large Blue Horses painted in 1911. My first experience with this painting was in a spring art history class. Both projectors were humming and clicking at full speed, flashing images two at a time on the white wall in front of me. My hands were blue and aching; the air conditioning always ran full blast no matter the outside temperature, and my professor had an uncanny ability to simultaneously lecture on two paintings at a rate of 30.3 seconds each, forcing me to scribble notes in the dim light as if my hand would burst into flames if it were left in one place too long.

Since this lecture focused on pre-WWI art from the German Expressionists, my notebook had been illuminated by a faint brownish grey glow that emanated from the images on the wall. The subjects and lighting in this class always had a direct effect on my mood, so on this day I not only felt ridiculously rushed but antsy and pessimistic. Perhaps it was the vibrant flash of color that caught my attention. Or maybe Marc's deliberate and optimistic approach. Whatever it was, few paintings ever held my attention. I didn't have the luxury of really looking at anything for more than a few moments before going back to making cramped hieroglyphics that would supposedly help me in the near future.

But The Large Blue Horses seemed to dissipate every negative wave of energy that had been flying at me for the past hour. It was like someone finally remembered to turn the lights on and look at the world properly. Not that Marc's brush strokes are ignorant to the rising tensions--but he believed in battling those tensions with color instead of bemoaning what others called inevitable fate. Marc's theory, along with other past and present colorists, promotes the idea that colors can activate and inspire society. Marc also believed that nature and animals would remind people about the important, good things that are worth living for. Notes and midterm forgotten, I really looked at this painting. This one really mattered.

I could continue, but what I mean to say is, this painting never fails to make me happy. It reminds me of spring and makes me glad that there are so many colors that naturally exist in our world. Anyway, I get carried away. And the picture on the blog really does no justice to the actual thing. But there you go--I love Franz Marc and his paintings and spring.