Blue wonders in the Blue Land
The Blue Land owes its name to the artists who found inspiration in the region and created their works there. Above all, Franz Marc, who gave the area this “honorary title” due to the changing bluish color and lighting moods.
Not far from Marc, who settled in Sindelsdorf from 1910 to 1914, Wassily Kandinsky and Gabriele Münter lived in Murnau am Staffelsee, 60 km from Munich.
Kandinsky was a co-founder of the New Munich Artists' Association in 1909. After a disagreement with the painter Charles Johann Palmié, Marc and Kandinsky left the association in 1911 and organized their first Blauer Reiter exhibition. In 1912, the almanac of the same name, “Der Blaue Reiter,” was published as a cover illustration.
In 1914, the loose alliance of the Blue Rider collapsed due to the beginning of the First World War and increasing discrepancies among the artists. Kandinsky and Münter left the so-called "Russenhaus" in Murnau (now called the Münter House) and moved to Switzerland. But the relationship didn't last. Kandinsky went back to his homeland, to Russia. A little later, Gabriele Münter moved to Scandinavia. She later returned to Germany and lived in Cologne, Munich and Murnau. Münter died in her home in Murnau in 1962 and is buried in the cemetery of St. Nicholas Church.
The Münter House can be visited today. Works by the Blaue Reiter are exhibited in the Murnau Castle Museum. The art walk around Murnau leads to the motifs of the Blue Rider. On a tour of Murnau you will not only learn interesting facts about the place, but also about the artist movement.