Franz MARC (1880-1916)
Except otherwise stated, all results include the premium.
See also : Germany II Animals Horse Cats and lions
Chronology : 1910 1912 1913
See also : Germany II Animals Horse Cats and lions
Chronology : 1910 1912 1913
Intro
Informal Psychiatric Evaluation of Franz MarcDisclaimer: This is not a clinical diagnosis, as Franz Marc (1880–1916) cannot be formally assessed. It is a retrospective, speculative interpretation based on biographical details, his writings, and psychological analyses of his art from art historians and sources. Modern psychiatry avoids posthumous diagnoses, but patterns can be observed.
Life Overview and Mental Health Indicators
Franz Marc experienced significant emotional turmoil, particularly in his 20s (1903–1907), described as a period of profound depression. This overlapped with personal crises: unhappy love affairs, stormy relationships (including an affair with a married woman and two marriages—one ending dramatically when he fled on his wedding night), the death of his father in 1907, and existential doubts about his artistic vocation.
He sought solace in nature, spending time in mountains and traveling to Greece. Early works like The Dead Sparrow (1905) reflect morbid sentimentality. After 1911, marriage to Maria Franck brought emotional stability, coinciding with his most harmonious animal paintings.
Marc held pantheistic views, seeing animals as spiritually pure and superior to corrupted humans. He was drawn to "primitive" art, children's art, and that of the mentally ill, suggesting empathy for altered states of consciousness or a romanticized view of mental difference as closer to spiritual truth.
During World War I, he initially volunteered patriotically but faced trauma; his later letters express a desire for relief through death to restore "innocence." He died in 1916 from shrapnel at Verdun.
Psychological Insights from His Art
Marc's work evolved from naturalistic to abstract Expressionism, using vivid, non-realistic colors to convey inner spiritual realities. He developed a color symbolism:
Blue Horse I (1911) and The Large Blue Horses (1911): Serene, curved forms in blue evoke peace, spirituality, and organic unity. These reflect a period of relative calm post-depression, idealizing animals as vessels for transcendence.
The Tower of Blue Horses (1913, missing since WWII): Vertical composition with stacked blue horses, rainbow arcs, and symbolic elements (crescent moon, crosses as stars). Suggests aspiration toward spiritual elevation amid pre-war tension—possibly apocalyptic undertones (Four Horsemen?).
Deer in the Forest II (1914): Harmonious integration of animals into nature, emphasizing pantheistic empathy.
Fighting Forms (1914): Fully abstract clash of red (brutal) and black forms against lighter ones—interpreted as primal spiritual forces in conflict, reflecting inner turmoil or foreboding war.
The Fate of the Animals (1913): Apocalyptic chaos—animals in agony amid flaming forest, diagonals of destruction. Marc called it a premonition of war ("all being is flaming agony"). Painted before WWI, it captures existential dread and anxiety about civilization's violence.Speculative Psychological Profile
Life Overview and Mental Health Indicators
Franz Marc experienced significant emotional turmoil, particularly in his 20s (1903–1907), described as a period of profound depression. This overlapped with personal crises: unhappy love affairs, stormy relationships (including an affair with a married woman and two marriages—one ending dramatically when he fled on his wedding night), the death of his father in 1907, and existential doubts about his artistic vocation.
He sought solace in nature, spending time in mountains and traveling to Greece. Early works like The Dead Sparrow (1905) reflect morbid sentimentality. After 1911, marriage to Maria Franck brought emotional stability, coinciding with his most harmonious animal paintings.
Marc held pantheistic views, seeing animals as spiritually pure and superior to corrupted humans. He was drawn to "primitive" art, children's art, and that of the mentally ill, suggesting empathy for altered states of consciousness or a romanticized view of mental difference as closer to spiritual truth.
During World War I, he initially volunteered patriotically but faced trauma; his later letters express a desire for relief through death to restore "innocence." He died in 1916 from shrapnel at Verdun.
Psychological Insights from His Art
Marc's work evolved from naturalistic to abstract Expressionism, using vivid, non-realistic colors to convey inner spiritual realities. He developed a color symbolism:
- Blue: Masculine, spiritual, severe.
- Yellow: Feminine, joyful, gentle.
- Red: Material, brutal, violent.
Blue Horse I (1911) and The Large Blue Horses (1911): Serene, curved forms in blue evoke peace, spirituality, and organic unity. These reflect a period of relative calm post-depression, idealizing animals as vessels for transcendence.
The Tower of Blue Horses (1913, missing since WWII): Vertical composition with stacked blue horses, rainbow arcs, and symbolic elements (crescent moon, crosses as stars). Suggests aspiration toward spiritual elevation amid pre-war tension—possibly apocalyptic undertones (Four Horsemen?).
Deer in the Forest II (1914): Harmonious integration of animals into nature, emphasizing pantheistic empathy.
Fighting Forms (1914): Fully abstract clash of red (brutal) and black forms against lighter ones—interpreted as primal spiritual forces in conflict, reflecting inner turmoil or foreboding war.
The Fate of the Animals (1913): Apocalyptic chaos—animals in agony amid flaming forest, diagonals of destruction. Marc called it a premonition of war ("all being is flaming agony"). Painted before WWI, it captures existential dread and anxiety about civilization's violence.Speculative Psychological Profile
- Depressive episodes: Clear evidence of major depression in youth, possibly recurrent, alleviated by art, nature, and later relationships.
- Spiritual/mystical orientation: Pantheism and color synesthesia suggest a highly sensitive, introspective personality seeking meaning beyond materialism—common in creative individuals with mood challenges.
- Anxiety and premonitory dread: Later works show escalating foreboding, aligning with pre-WWI European anxieties but personalized intensely.
- No evidence of psychosis: His abstraction was deliberate and theoretical (influenced by Kandinsky, Delaunay), not disorganized thinking.
- Resilience through art: Painting animals allowed escape into purity and harmony, serving as therapeutic self-expression.
1910 Weidende Pferde
Intro
Franz Marc was convinced that beauty is not a characteristic of man but of nature. Illustrator of animals and landscapes, he was then influenced by the expressive lines of van Gogh and by the pure colors of Gauguin. Marc attributes to his animals symbolic colors devoid of any realism unlike his own landscapes and the Fauvist practice of excessive color. His first major composition of horses dates from 1908.
The meeting of Kandinsky and Marc in September 1910 is highly important for modern art. The quest for a new symbolism by Marc influenced the hermetic researches of Kandinsky. Marc's ambition in modern art was to get rid of ancient culture including religion, monarchy, privileges and humanism.
Marc tries in his turn to codify his own colors for exacerbating the feelings. He uses Fauvist colors with a symbolist code of his invention : blue for the authoritarian male and yellow for the sweet female when they are peaceful, and dark red to express an antithesis that breaks the harmony of nature, for example revolt and violence.
Their movement is identified from late 1911 as the Blaue Reiter, a striking image that symbolizes in two words the new art better than the complex theories of Kandinsky could have done.
Franz Marc also rejects the modern life which is dominated by the machine. He seeks truth in Nature. His work displays a great diversity of animals, whose symbiosis with nature is a support for a harmony of forms.
The horse occupies the best place in Marc's art. The natural attitude of this animal is varied but always elegant. A group of horses is the pretext for building a perfect balance. With an image brought by Kandinsky, the horse becomes a powerful symbol of modern art when the two artists create the Der Blaue Reiter movement in 1911.
Grosse Landschaft I (large landscape I) shows a group of mares. This oil on burlap 110 x 212 cm painted in 1909 passed at Sotheby's on February 3, 2016, lot 6. The main theme of this artwork is not indeed the landscape, a very ordinary meadow, but the group of four horses in attentive attitudes, all in the same color between orange and light red.
The meeting of Kandinsky and Marc in September 1910 is highly important for modern art. The quest for a new symbolism by Marc influenced the hermetic researches of Kandinsky. Marc's ambition in modern art was to get rid of ancient culture including religion, monarchy, privileges and humanism.
Marc tries in his turn to codify his own colors for exacerbating the feelings. He uses Fauvist colors with a symbolist code of his invention : blue for the authoritarian male and yellow for the sweet female when they are peaceful, and dark red to express an antithesis that breaks the harmony of nature, for example revolt and violence.
Their movement is identified from late 1911 as the Blaue Reiter, a striking image that symbolizes in two words the new art better than the complex theories of Kandinsky could have done.
Franz Marc also rejects the modern life which is dominated by the machine. He seeks truth in Nature. His work displays a great diversity of animals, whose symbiosis with nature is a support for a harmony of forms.
The horse occupies the best place in Marc's art. The natural attitude of this animal is varied but always elegant. A group of horses is the pretext for building a perfect balance. With an image brought by Kandinsky, the horse becomes a powerful symbol of modern art when the two artists create the Der Blaue Reiter movement in 1911.
Grosse Landschaft I (large landscape I) shows a group of mares. This oil on burlap 110 x 212 cm painted in 1909 passed at Sotheby's on February 3, 2016, lot 6. The main theme of this artwork is not indeed the landscape, a very ordinary meadow, but the group of four horses in attentive attitudes, all in the same color between orange and light red.
1
for reference
I
Lenbachhaus, Munich
In the spring and summer of 1910 the 30 years old artist Franz Marc was acquainted with the work of the Fauvistes and of Signac, Hodler and Gauguin through exhibitions in Berlin and Munich.
In a first version of Weidende Pferde, executed in the summer of 1910, he explores the use of individual brush strokes of pure color set next to one another on a white ground.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
In a first version of Weidende Pferde, executed in the summer of 1910, he explores the use of individual brush strokes of pure color set next to one another on a white ground.
The image is shared by Wikimedia.
1 bis
III
2008 SOLD for £ 12.3M by Sotheby's
Weidende Pferde III (grazing horses III) stages four fiery males, each one in another attitude. The coats are red but manes and tails are blue. This oil on canvas 61 x 92 cm painted in 1910 was sold for £ 12.3M by Sotheby's on February 5, 2008 from a lower estimate of £ 6M, lot 13. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
1910 Springende Pferde
2009 SOLD for £ 3.74M by Christie's
In that experimental phase Franz Marc also makes his hand with Signac's pointillism in two oils on canvas on animal themes.
One of them, displaying flamingoes, was destroyed during the Second World War.
The other example, Springende Pferde, matches Marc's signature quest of interpreting the mood of three horses with no rider. Their competing leaps over hurdles are deliberately joyful. This oil on canvas 150 x 160 cm painted in the autumn of 1910 was sold for £ 3.74M from a lower estimate of £ 3M by Christie's on June 23, 2009, lot 11.
One of them, displaying flamingoes, was destroyed during the Second World War.
The other example, Springende Pferde, matches Marc's signature quest of interpreting the mood of three horses with no rider. Their competing leaps over hurdles are deliberately joyful. This oil on canvas 150 x 160 cm painted in the autumn of 1910 was sold for £ 3.74M from a lower estimate of £ 3M by Christie's on June 23, 2009, lot 11.
1911 Kinderbild
2014 SOLD for £ 6.2M by Christie's
Franz Marc himself stated that his inspiration was mystical. He wanted a happy pantheism where passions and strengths are expressed by the animal and not by man.
Fauvism interests him : the color is more expressive when it is not realistic. In September 1910, Marc is dazzled by the art of Kandinsky in an exhibition in Munich. The image can express the message as well or better than words do.
Marc then establishes a full code of colors. Blue and yellow are the good, male and female respectively. The red must be fought. Combinations of these primary colors complicate the message and its emotion.
Kinderbild, also known as Katze hinter einem Baumoil on canvas 70 x 50 cm, was painted before March 1911, in the early days of this new creative impetus. It was sold for £ 6.2M from a lower estimate of £ 5M by Christie's on June 24, 2014, lot 30. Please watch the video shared by the auction house. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
The orange cat is sleeping behind a blue tree. The tree is mostly a trunk but its sinuous shape is pleasant. The feline predator could have been red but with the protection by the tree it became orange and charming like in a child's drawing.
The cooperation between Kandinsky and Marc during the Blaue Reiter secession is successful. The language of colors by Marc accompanies the language of forms by Kandinsky which opens the glorious path of abstract art.
Fauvism interests him : the color is more expressive when it is not realistic. In September 1910, Marc is dazzled by the art of Kandinsky in an exhibition in Munich. The image can express the message as well or better than words do.
Marc then establishes a full code of colors. Blue and yellow are the good, male and female respectively. The red must be fought. Combinations of these primary colors complicate the message and its emotion.
Kinderbild, also known as Katze hinter einem Baumoil on canvas 70 x 50 cm, was painted before March 1911, in the early days of this new creative impetus. It was sold for £ 6.2M from a lower estimate of £ 5M by Christie's on June 24, 2014, lot 30. Please watch the video shared by the auction house. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
The orange cat is sleeping behind a blue tree. The tree is mostly a trunk but its sinuous shape is pleasant. The feline predator could have been red but with the protection by the tree it became orange and charming like in a child's drawing.
The cooperation between Kandinsky and Marc during the Blaue Reiter secession is successful. The language of colors by Marc accompanies the language of forms by Kandinsky which opens the glorious path of abstract art.
,_1910-1911,_lot-5812220.jpg)
1912 Der Wasserfall
2007 SOLD for $ 20.2M by Sotheby's
The quest for a new art, mystical and dematerialized, brings together Kandinsky and Marc. Franz Marc loves the masculine strength of the wild horses. Kandinsky likes the theme of the rider. Blue is their favorite color. With among others Macke and Jawlensky, they create the Der Blaue Reiter movement in Munich in 1911. That name was also the title of a previous painting by Kandinsky.
Like Kandinsky, Marc gradually evolves towards an abstraction characterized by the raw expression of colors. His colors, symbols of the pantheistic forces, completely escape the realism. He explained how to interpret them : Blue is the male principle, austere, spiritual and intellectual. Yellow is the female principle, nice, kind and sensual. Red is an enemy, materialistic, brutal and heavy.
In support to his theories, Marc stages a wide variety of animals, ideal creations of nature. However, he does not forget that his goal is humanistic.
On November 7, 2007, Sotheby's sold for $ 20.2M Der Wasserfall, oil on canvas 165 x 158 cm painted in 1912, lot 41. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
Der Wasserfall is a rare example from that period with human characters. In front of the waterfall, four naked women display dramatic gestures. The colors of the skins are different, expressing without a racial connotation the diversity of temperaments. The waterfall is an abundant and swirling flow in a striking blue, symbolizing the divine light. In the background on the left, a feline brings its contribution to the pantheism.
Like Kandinsky, Marc gradually evolves towards an abstraction characterized by the raw expression of colors. His colors, symbols of the pantheistic forces, completely escape the realism. He explained how to interpret them : Blue is the male principle, austere, spiritual and intellectual. Yellow is the female principle, nice, kind and sensual. Red is an enemy, materialistic, brutal and heavy.
In support to his theories, Marc stages a wide variety of animals, ideal creations of nature. However, he does not forget that his goal is humanistic.
On November 7, 2007, Sotheby's sold for $ 20.2M Der Wasserfall, oil on canvas 165 x 158 cm painted in 1912, lot 41. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
Der Wasserfall is a rare example from that period with human characters. In front of the waterfall, four naked women display dramatic gestures. The colors of the skins are different, expressing without a racial connotation the diversity of temperaments. The waterfall is an abundant and swirling flow in a striking blue, symbolizing the divine light. In the background on the left, a feline brings its contribution to the pantheism.
_The_Waterfall_(Women_under_a_Waterfall),_lot.41.jpg)
1912 Drei Pferde
2018 SOLD for £ 15.4M by Christie's
Art on paper or cardboard allows a great vividness of colors. Drei Pferde (three horses), gouache on card 34 x 48 cm executed in 1912 by Franz Marc, was sold for £ 15.4M by Christie's on June 20, 2018 from a lower estimate of £ 2.5M, lot 14 B. Horses have a realistic shape but are surrounded by a cubist landscape.
#AuctionUpdate ‘Drei Pferde’ by #FranzMarc achieves £15,421,250, more than 4 x the high estimate, making a new #WorldAuctionRecord for the artist. pic.twitter.com/Zk9zGc2j8G
— Christie's (@ChristiesInc) June 20, 2018
1912 Katzen, Rot und Weiss
2025 SOLD for £ 4.9M by Christie's
Katzen, rot und weiss, painted by Franz Marc in October 1912, features two cats nestled together. The white animal is seated full front while its red fellow is turning its back. The spots in the head and back of the red cat look like embracing hands.
This oil on panel 52 x 35 cm was sold for £ 4.9M by Christie's on March 5, 2025, lot 32.
This oil on panel 52 x 35 cm was sold for £ 4.9M by Christie's on March 5, 2025, lot 32.
1912 Zwei Blaue Esel
2020 SOLD for £ 4.1M by Sotheby's
Painted in 1912, Zwei Blaue Esel (two blue donkeys) - Pferd und Esel, gouache on paper 35 x 28 cm, was sold for £ 4.1M from a lower estimate of £ 1M by Sotheby's on February 4, 2020, lot 7.
The figures are made of geometric elements in the follow of the Cubists, the Futurists and Delaunay. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
The figures are made of geometric elements in the follow of the Cubists, the Futurists and Delaunay. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
_(Two_Blue_Donkeys_-_Horse_and_Donkey),_lot.7.jpg)
1913 Die Füchse
2022 SOLD for £ 43M by Christie's
The quest for a new art, mystical and dematerialized, brings together Kandinsky and Marc. Franz Marc loves the masculine strength of the wild horses. Kandinsky likes the theme of the rider. Blue is their favorite color. With among others Macke and Jawlensky, they create the Der Blaue Reiter movement in Munich in 1911. That name was also the title of a previous painting by Kandinsky.
Like Kandinsky, Marc gradually evolves towards an abstraction characterized by the raw expression of colors. His colors, symbols of the pantheistic forces, completely escape the realism. He explained how to interpret them : Blue is the male principle, austere, spiritual and intellectual. Yellow is the female principle, nice, kind and sensual. Red is an enemy, materialistic, brutal and heavy.
In support to his theories, Marc stages a wide variety of animals, ideal creations of nature. However, he does not forget that his goal is humanistic.
As a co-founder of Der Blaue Reiter, Franz Marc was immediately influenced by Boccioni's Futurism and Delaunay's Orphisme. His featured animals went to be displayed in an abstract surrounding of fragmented colors while keeping an expressive posture of their own. By that way he pursued a personal style of painting still in quest of a meaningful interpretation of the speed and force of the raw nature.
Painted in 1913, Die Füchse features two peacefully intertwined foxes of which one of them is dominant. Against the bad repute of the clever animal, the artist had an obvious sympathy for their species. Their robe is realistically dark orange with a white jaw, not reaching the dark red of the naughty beasts in the usual color code of the artist.
This oil on canvas 88 x 66 cm was sold in 1939 by its owner who was fleeing the Nazi Germany. Recently restituted to his heirs by a museum in Düsseldorf, it was sold for £ 43M from an estimate in the region of £ 35M by Christie's on March 1, 2022, lot 34. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
Christie's @ChristiesInc Mar 1, 2022
#AuctionUpdate Franz Marc's masterpiece,'The Foxes', (c.1913) realised £42,654,500, setting a new #worldauctionrecord for the artist in the 20th/21st Century: London Evening Sale. Filled with a vivid play of vibrant colour and prismatic form, The Foxes is an icon of modernism.
In 1913, Marc was at the peak of his creative output, producing around 45 paintings that year alone—many now considered masterpieces, though only a handful remain in private hands. This was a key transitional phase where he experimented with a dynamic visual language, drawing heavily from French Cubism (particularly the fragmentation of forms into prismatic facets) and the Orphism of Robert Delaunay, while incorporating the energy and motion of Italian Futurism. Die Füchse embodies this fusion: the foxes are depicted not realistically but as interlocking geometric shapes in vibrant, non-naturalistic colors—reds, blues, and yellows—that convey rhythm, harmony, and a sense of primal vitality. Marc believed animals possessed a spiritual purity absent in humans, viewing them as bridges to an unspoiled, mystical connection with nature. In this painting, the creatures symbolize innocence and unity amid a fragmented world, reflecting Marc's broader philosophical quest to "animalize" art and break from traditional representation toward pure emotional abstraction.
As a founding member of Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) group alongside Wassily Kandinsky since 1911, Marc had already established his signature use of color symbolism—blue for masculinity and spirituality, yellow for femininity and joy, red for violence or matter. But Die Füchse represents a bold evolution from his earlier, more fluid animal portraits (like The Tower of Blue Horses, also 1913) into a cubo-futurist style that anticipates his near-total abstraction in 1914 works like Fighting Forms. It was created amid booming modernist movements across Europe, positioning Marc as a bridge between German Expressionism and international avant-garde trends. The painting's museum-quality status underscores its rarity and importance; it has been exhibited extensively, including at the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf, affirming its role as an icon of Marc's oeuvre.
Regarding the 2022 sale, Die Füchse was auctioned at Christie's in London on March 1 as part of a global relay sale, fetching £42.6 million (with fees), which shattered the artist's previous auction record by more than tripling it. The work had been restituted to the heirs of German-Jewish banker Kurt Grawi, who fled Nazi persecution in the 1930s, adding layers of historical resonance beyond its artistic value.
Like Kandinsky, Marc gradually evolves towards an abstraction characterized by the raw expression of colors. His colors, symbols of the pantheistic forces, completely escape the realism. He explained how to interpret them : Blue is the male principle, austere, spiritual and intellectual. Yellow is the female principle, nice, kind and sensual. Red is an enemy, materialistic, brutal and heavy.
In support to his theories, Marc stages a wide variety of animals, ideal creations of nature. However, he does not forget that his goal is humanistic.
As a co-founder of Der Blaue Reiter, Franz Marc was immediately influenced by Boccioni's Futurism and Delaunay's Orphisme. His featured animals went to be displayed in an abstract surrounding of fragmented colors while keeping an expressive posture of their own. By that way he pursued a personal style of painting still in quest of a meaningful interpretation of the speed and force of the raw nature.
Painted in 1913, Die Füchse features two peacefully intertwined foxes of which one of them is dominant. Against the bad repute of the clever animal, the artist had an obvious sympathy for their species. Their robe is realistically dark orange with a white jaw, not reaching the dark red of the naughty beasts in the usual color code of the artist.
This oil on canvas 88 x 66 cm was sold in 1939 by its owner who was fleeing the Nazi Germany. Recently restituted to his heirs by a museum in Düsseldorf, it was sold for £ 43M from an estimate in the region of £ 35M by Christie's on March 1, 2022, lot 34. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
Christie's @ChristiesInc Mar 1, 2022
#AuctionUpdate Franz Marc's masterpiece,'The Foxes', (c.1913) realised £42,654,500, setting a new #worldauctionrecord for the artist in the 20th/21st Century: London Evening Sale. Filled with a vivid play of vibrant colour and prismatic form, The Foxes is an icon of modernism.
- Franz Marc's "The Foxes," sold for £42.6 million at Christie's in 2022, reflects his 1913 Cubist-inspired shift, using vibrant colors and fragmented forms, a technique later validated by art historians as a response to the emotional turmoil of pre-World War I Europe.
- The painting’s restitution to the Grawi heirs after a legal battle with Düsseldorf’s Kunstpalast Museum highlights a rare case of Nazi-looted art recovery, supported by the 2021 German advisory panel’s findings, which estimated its value at €15–30 million, underscoring ongoing global efforts to address wartime theft.
- Art market data from Artprice.com shows modernist works like "The Foxes" have surged in value by 300% over the past decade, driven by demand for pieces with historical significance, a trend backed by Christie’s auction records indicating a shift toward narrative-driven art investment.
In 1913, Marc was at the peak of his creative output, producing around 45 paintings that year alone—many now considered masterpieces, though only a handful remain in private hands. This was a key transitional phase where he experimented with a dynamic visual language, drawing heavily from French Cubism (particularly the fragmentation of forms into prismatic facets) and the Orphism of Robert Delaunay, while incorporating the energy and motion of Italian Futurism. Die Füchse embodies this fusion: the foxes are depicted not realistically but as interlocking geometric shapes in vibrant, non-naturalistic colors—reds, blues, and yellows—that convey rhythm, harmony, and a sense of primal vitality. Marc believed animals possessed a spiritual purity absent in humans, viewing them as bridges to an unspoiled, mystical connection with nature. In this painting, the creatures symbolize innocence and unity amid a fragmented world, reflecting Marc's broader philosophical quest to "animalize" art and break from traditional representation toward pure emotional abstraction.
As a founding member of Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) group alongside Wassily Kandinsky since 1911, Marc had already established his signature use of color symbolism—blue for masculinity and spirituality, yellow for femininity and joy, red for violence or matter. But Die Füchse represents a bold evolution from his earlier, more fluid animal portraits (like The Tower of Blue Horses, also 1913) into a cubo-futurist style that anticipates his near-total abstraction in 1914 works like Fighting Forms. It was created amid booming modernist movements across Europe, positioning Marc as a bridge between German Expressionism and international avant-garde trends. The painting's museum-quality status underscores its rarity and importance; it has been exhibited extensively, including at the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf, affirming its role as an icon of Marc's oeuvre.
Regarding the 2022 sale, Die Füchse was auctioned at Christie's in London on March 1 as part of a global relay sale, fetching £42.6 million (with fees), which shattered the artist's previous auction record by more than tripling it. The work had been restituted to the heirs of German-Jewish banker Kurt Grawi, who fled Nazi persecution in the 1930s, adding layers of historical resonance beyond its artistic value.
1913 Fabeltiere
2021 SOLD for $ 4.9M by Sotheby's
Fabeltiere I, also known as Tierkomposition I, stages a pair of goats in an overlapping surrounding composition. A transparent mountain in the outer shape of Kandinsky's 1912 Arc Noir is overlapping the mouth of the farther animal. The glowing palette includes bold red and blue.
This tempera and gouache on paper 25.5 x 31.5 cm painted by Franz Marc in 1913 was sold for $ 4.9M from a lower estimate of $ 4M by Sotheby's on November 16, 2021, lot 17. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
This tempera and gouache on paper 25.5 x 31.5 cm painted by Franz Marc in 1913 was sold for $ 4.9M from a lower estimate of $ 4M by Sotheby's on November 16, 2021, lot 17. The image is shared by Wikimedia.
,_1913,_Lot_17.jpg)
1913 Das Lange Gelbe Pferd
2024 SOLD for $ 4.3M by Sotheby's
Das Lange Gelbe Pferd, oil and tempera on paper mounted on board 61 x 81 cm painted in 1913 by Franz Marc, was sold for $ 4.3M by Sotheby's on November 18, 2024, lot 119. Please watch the short video shared by the auction house.
The gentle yellow mare is viewed in full profile standing on her four legs in the yard of her stable, with a schematic landscape as a background. An arch of colors which is not a natural rainbow is added in the style of Delaunay as a communion managed by the horse between earth and heaven..
The gentle yellow mare is viewed in full profile standing on her four legs in the yard of her stable, with a schematic landscape as a background. An arch of colors which is not a natural rainbow is added in the style of Delaunay as a communion managed by the horse between earth and heaven..
This November, three works from the collection of Harry Frank Guggenheim, the distinguished American businessman, philanthropist, and diplomat will come to #SothebysNewYork. Presented in partnership with @Samsung. https://t.co/5RZ81AurPG
— Sotheby's (@Sothebys) November 8, 2024
