Lot Essay
Like many of his contemporaries, Theo Mier was inspired by Gauguin and embarked on an adventure to the South Pacific to satisfy his yearning for a primitive, still intact culture. He was, however disappointed with Guadeloupe and Tahiti and decided to return to Basle in 1934.
Refused to relent and determined to find an "untouched and untamed" land, the artist set forth again two years later and finally found himself a home in Bali which facinated the artist with her sophistication at all times.
Besides Bali where the artist settled for over twenty years, he had also spent a few years in Thailand, with his Thai Wife La-iad. The present lot is actually a depiction of a mountain region, northwest of Chiang Mai. The photographs and drawings which would accompany the present lot were actually preparatory work done by the artist for the creation of this work. It was the intention of the artist for them to stay together with the painting.
The painter was at his early seventy's when the present lot was painted. Relatively less colourful than his earlier works, the darker tone of the painting was a reflection of a more sober mood of the artist. With his long years of settlement in the East; what had held the artist in constant awe (as testified by the present lot) was not the physical beauty of an exotical landscape but the inherent spirituality of a primitive culture.
Refused to relent and determined to find an "untouched and untamed" land, the artist set forth again two years later and finally found himself a home in Bali which facinated the artist with her sophistication at all times.
Besides Bali where the artist settled for over twenty years, he had also spent a few years in Thailand, with his Thai Wife La-iad. The present lot is actually a depiction of a mountain region, northwest of Chiang Mai. The photographs and drawings which would accompany the present lot were actually preparatory work done by the artist for the creation of this work. It was the intention of the artist for them to stay together with the painting.
The painter was at his early seventy's when the present lot was painted. Relatively less colourful than his earlier works, the darker tone of the painting was a reflection of a more sober mood of the artist. With his long years of settlement in the East; what had held the artist in constant awe (as testified by the present lot) was not the physical beauty of an exotical landscape but the inherent spirituality of a primitive culture.