The Blue Lake (Der blaue See)

Gabriele MünterWW-1912-100113

1912·Oil on canvas·45.4 × 60.5 cm (17 7/8 × 23 3/4 in.)

<p>Depicting the rolling terrain near Murnau, <em>Der blaue See (The Blue Lake)</em> shows a slightly elevated view onto Lake Staffel, a frequent subject of the artist from the 1910s into the 1950s. Among Münter’s early depictions of this subject, this particular composition features saturated colors and boldly styled contour lines typical of this pivotal moment in Münter’s early development. “After a short period of agony,” she described, “I made a big leap [in Murnau], from copying nature—more or less impressionistically—to feeling its content, to abstracting, to presenting a distillation.”</p>

Catalogue

Year: 1912
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 45.4 × 60.5 cm (17 7/8 × 23 3/4 in.)
Collection: Art Institute of Chicago
Artist: Gabriele Münter

Artist

Gabriele Münter

Painting

German Expressionist painter and printmaker, Gabriele Münter produced vibrant figurative and abstract works of art noted for their dramatic palette and gestural application of paint. The Berlin-born artist began her training at the Phalanx School in Munich, where she met her future partner, Wassily Kandinsky. With him and Franz Marc, she founded the progressive artists' group Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider). The movement attracted creators who believed that art should, first and foremost, embody artist’s individual mental, emotional, and spiritual truths through a turn away from recognizable subject matter. Münter's landscapes, portraits, and folk art-inspired works carried emotional depth and abstract elements, reflecting both her personal experiences and broader modernist trends.

Berlin, Germany

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