Elephant (Elefant)

winter 1910 – 1911

Winter 1910–11: the turn to his mature manner

In the view of the writer Morgan Meis, Marc became an artist this very winter: out of earlier confusion comes a unified vision, his animals emerge pure and true from the canvas, and colour becomes the main thing.

February 1911

Meeting Wassily Kandinsky

Although Marc joined the association in autumn 1910, he meets its leader, the Russian abstract painter Wassily Kandinsky, only in February 1911.

December 1911

Leaving the NKVM and founding Der Blaue Reiter

In December 1911 Marc, together with Macke and Kandinsky, breaks away from the Neue Künstlervereinigung and organises his own group, Der Blaue Reiter; he is also credited with founding the journal that became the centre of the circle.

December 1911 – January 1912

The first Blue Rider exhibition

Several of Marc's works are shown at the first Blue Rider exhibition at the Thannhauser Galleries in Munich, which has been called the apex of German Expressionism.

1913

Married: Maria Marc

1914

Called up at the start of the First World War

At the outbreak of war in 1914 Marc, like August Macke, is mobilised and sent to the front; early biographers thought he had volunteered, but conscription was practically impossible to avoid.