Art History!

I thought we probably ought to have an ArtH section, seeing as most of us take it, so here we are.

I shall start by posting a copy of the mediocre essay I literally just finished, due first period to-morrow, which I've had since last ... tuesday to do? I've had over a week, anyways. Huzzah! Procrastination! (that's why it's so deplorably short, too)

German Expressionism and socio-political influences wrote:

Franz Marc is a German Expressionist artists, in whose works numerous themes, subjects, and techniques can be seen to relate to the socio-political climate in Germany during the time Marc lived there.

Born February fourth, 1880, Marc lived in a pre-WW1 Germany, filled with the decadence and industrialisation of a post-Victorian society, and an underlying current of tension and unease. As the Great War loomed closer, naturally the tension in Germany increased, as did Marc’s negative opinion of his society and their beliefs. Fascinated with animals, Marc portrayed his discomfort with society through various animals such as deer, horses, and foxes. It was this discomfort which leant the vicious, glass-like beauty to his work; ‘Fate of the Animals’ and the impending darkness and fear in ‘Deer in the Woods’.

‘Deer in the Woods’, painted a year before ‘Fate of the Animals’, deals with Marc’s fear of the upcoming war which was to break out two years later. In the painting a placid yellow deer is situated in a claustrophobic, harsh landscape which ends in a black tunnel. Here the unnatural yellow of the deer’s coat is possibly representative of his belief in the innocence of beasts, something which mankind has renounced, and how they too would suffer from our mistakes (as represented by the blackness in the background of the painting, possibly also indicative of WWl). The cramped, circular composition may also have been intended to resemble as machine, portraying Marc’s rather negative outlook on the affect industrialisation would have on animal-life world wide.
‘Fate of the Animals’, painted in 1913, also deals with an animal subject, however rather than speculating as to the damage which mankind may wreak upon the innocence, it portrays it. Horses, bulls, foxes, and other animals are shown in a tumultuous landscape, stabbed at by shafts of multi-coloured light. The composition is crowded; the animals appear trapped, doomed to their ‘fate’. Painted only a year before the outbreak of WWl, ‘Fate of the Animals’ can be seen to again deal with his fear of the impending darkness and violence, which was present also in Germany society at the time.

A clear political and social influence upon Marc’s artworks is of course WWl, the fear which spread through Germany and indeed all of Europe prior to and during its outbreak, and his concern for animals can be seen in many of his major works through his often violent brushstrokes, and increasingly his use of an almost blood red (as in ‘Fighting Forms’). Another fear (which was common at the unsteady time between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries) was that of industrialisation. Having experienced a massive technological leap during his lifetime, Marc may have feared the consequences, should man truly harness the power of machines, both for the animals, and humans alike. This is again represented in his compositions, more so by subject and composition than technique – his continued study of animal life (horses in particular) and the ever more cramped surroundings in which he placed them (which can be seen through the change from the sprawling landscape behind the ‘Yellow Cow’ to the almost cage-like surroundings of ‘Fate of the Animals’.

I think I was supposed to write one of those, but it was due after I left so I never even read the question