Two Horses, Red and Blue 1912

Franz Marc made "Two Horses, Red and Blue", with oil on paper. It's like he's wrestling with form and color, not just representing horses, but reinventing them. I love how the strokes of paint, especially in the red horse, are so present, almost like you could peel them off. The color is brushed on, the paint thin and translucent in places, thick and opaque in others. It's all there, right on the surface. Like the process of the painting is as important as the image itself. The angular forms could suggest a kind of harmony that's more fractured, more modern, than we might expect. The way Marc uses color reminds me of Matisse, in that he isn't using it to describe but as a tool to unlock a mood, or a feeling. It's this kind of conversation across time, where artists are pushing and pulling at each other's ideas, that keeps art alive and kicking.