Lot Essay
Painted circa 1948
From about 1947, Bali was beginning to develop into a tourist haven. As travel companies resumed their services increasingly wealthy tourists from Europe, America, Australia and Singapore flocked to the idyllic island. From this period numerous works of art were purchased directly from Le Mayeur. Prospective buyers could contact him directly as he sold from home and such was the demand that it is rumoured that the paint was not even dry before these canvasses were passing onto the next on the waiting list. One of the most popular subject matters seems to have been that with numerous figures, all Pollok of course, bathing in the lily pond in front of his house at Sanur on Bali (cf. Jop Ubbens and Cathinka Huizing, Adrien-Jean le Mayeur : Painter-Traveller, Wijk en Aalburg, 1995, pp 163, 168, 174, 180). Although his thematic range had become rather inflexible with his daily surroundings being the one and only source of inspiration it was his ability to create so many different versions of the same subject which made them remarkable.
This present lot can be dated to circa 1948 and can therefore be seen as one of the prototypes for the "Lily-pond" series.
From about 1947, Bali was beginning to develop into a tourist haven. As travel companies resumed their services increasingly wealthy tourists from Europe, America, Australia and Singapore flocked to the idyllic island. From this period numerous works of art were purchased directly from Le Mayeur. Prospective buyers could contact him directly as he sold from home and such was the demand that it is rumoured that the paint was not even dry before these canvasses were passing onto the next on the waiting list. One of the most popular subject matters seems to have been that with numerous figures, all Pollok of course, bathing in the lily pond in front of his house at Sanur on Bali (cf. Jop Ubbens and Cathinka Huizing, Adrien-Jean le Mayeur : Painter-Traveller, Wijk en Aalburg, 1995, pp 163, 168, 174, 180). Although his thematic range had become rather inflexible with his daily surroundings being the one and only source of inspiration it was his ability to create so many different versions of the same subject which made them remarkable.
This present lot can be dated to circa 1948 and can therefore be seen as one of the prototypes for the "Lily-pond" series.