"You will understand my paintings wherever you may see them. For everything in this little paradise which I created for myself was made to be painted."
Standing as a stunning amalgamation of pastel hues, Balinese Maidens in the Garden by Adrien Jean Le Mayeur de Merprès is a captivating embodiment of the artist’s intuitive impressionist style. This present lot is situated in the lavish dream-scape that was Le Mayeur’s garden, which was constructed for the sole purpose of facilitating his work. Le Mayeur wanted nothing more than to be surrounded by pure, unadulterated beauty, and his garden was the perfect paradise from which he could find total isolation and solitude. In the quiet comfort of his personal haven, Le Mayeur chronicles an evocative meditation on the many iterations of light, and provides his viewers with a vignette into Bali’s dazzling natural phenomena
The three maidens dominate the picture plane, revealing how physically close the artist was to his models when he rendered them. Together, they form a condensed triangular arrangement, permeating the composition with a sense of strength and harmony that echo their sisterly camaraderie.
She looks sweetly towards the mythological temple sculpture that stands elevated on a platform and appears almost ethereally suspended in mid-air in the upper right of the canvas.
Le Mayeur paid particular attention to the specific gesticulations of each of his muses, which resulted in impeccably observed pieces that become animated with life and authenticity. As one girl thoughtfully fixes the headgear of her friend with her nimble, delicate fingers,another leans towards her and comfortably presses her palms on her thighs.
With deft strokes of pearly golds and magenta, Le Mayeur decorates the fine details of their sarongs and headdresses with floral patterns, and imbues their traditional wear with a kaleidoscopic quality like no other.
Le Mayeur juxtaposes the t.mes less relevance of the centuries-old sculpture with the youthful maidens before it, drawing a parallel between them and highlighting the everlasting beauty of the human form.
As the swaying leaves of the palm tree dangle softly above the Balinese beauties, sheltering them from the sweltering heat of the tropics, Le Mayeur unveils his masterly ability in rendering the ever-changing interplay between light and colour, as the light wash of his opalescent paint brush touches upon the maidens’ dappled skin.
Set in the warm seclusion of the artist’s picturesque home, Le Mayeur reveals his innate ingenuity and practiced familiarity with the vivid harmony of beauty, sunlight and colour. Balinese Maidens in the Garden is a captivating snapshot of the languorous warmth that imbued every corner of the tropical paradise that Le Mayeur created; as three Balinese beauties sit in luxuriant repose. With a subdued interplay of tonal hues that is reminiscent of his pre-war works, Le Mayeur presents us with one of his earlier explorations in capturing the incandescent features of light.
Perhaps inspired by the European visionaries within the realm of Impressionism at the t.mes , Le Mayeur similarly honed his penchant for visualising the enthralling sensations of the untainted island of Bali in its most natural and veracious state. In pastel hues of pink, yellow and plum, the artist fabricates an ethereal world of beauty with his masterful brushwork and soft streaks of impasto. With his highly impressionistic style, Le Mayeur reduces flowers to dots of vibrancy, and leaves to mere strokes of verdant paint, as the sun streams gently in the hidden enclave.
Whether deep in performing their tasks or gazing into the distance in captivation, the maidens are painted with complementary light and dark shades, delineating their sun-kissed torsos. Widely heralded for his unique dedication to the articulation of beauty and sunlight, Le Mayeur was an artist who was endlessly fascinated by Bali’s lush landscapes, flourishing gardens and enchanting womenfolk. Indeed, Balinese Maidens in the Garden is a loving depiction of Le Mayeur’s sun-drenched Sanur garden, which he transformed into a tropical paradise, full of exuberant verdure and iridescent light.
"I've evidently made all things serviceable to my art. All my actions have but one purpose: facilitating my work."
- 1880
- 1897
- 1916-18
- 1919-22
- 1923-24
- 1927-28
- 1929-30
- 1932
- 1933
- 1935
- 1942
- 1956
- 1958
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1880Adrien Jean Le Mayeur de Merprès is born into a noble English family on the 9th of September, 1880 in Ixelles, Brussels.
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1897Enrolls at the Ecole Polytechnique (College of Technology) of the Universite Libre in Brussels.
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1916-18Le Mayeur voluntarily enlists in the Belgian Army on the 2nd of March,1916 at Calais.
He serves for another three years as a soldat artist and spends most of the t.mes at the Yser front line documenting the events and scenes of war. -
1919-22Le Mayeur embarks on several years of intensive travel, documenting his journeys and choosing locations at his leisure.
He first leaves for Venice at the end of World War I and then sets out for North Africa (Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia) in 1920. He eventually reaches Asia via India, depicting mainly urban scenes, and even visits Cambodia, before spending a year in the South of France and Italy.
During his sojourns, the Brussels based company, Co. Felix Mommen, becomes his business representative and sells his paintings throughout Europe. -
1923-24Le Mayeur returns to Belgium following the death of his father, Adrien Senior.
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1927-28Inspired by the works of Paul Gaugin, Le Mayeur journeys to Nossi be, an island off the north-west coast of Madagascar.
In search of exotic lands and tropical light, he travels throughout Madagascar, Dhibouti, Damascus, Istanbul, the South of France and Morocco. -
1929-30Visits the Pacific Island of Tahiti.
Visits Bali for the first t.mes after watching a film about the island.
He continues his travels and visits Benares and Jaipur in India, Colombo and Marseilles. -
1932Moves to Bali, Indonesia and decides to make it his home for the remaining years of his life.
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1933Holds an exhibition in Singapore, Exhibition of Bali Paintings, at the Young Women Christian Association (YWCA) in Raffles Quay, followed by three more at the YWCA, Singapore, in 1935, 1937 and 1942.
The exhibition garners huge supporters from all over the world, many of whom are prestigious European and American collects ors, including the governor of Singapore, S Cecil Clements, who goes on to display Le Mayeur’s painting in the Government House. -
1935Marries his favorite model and muse, Ni Wayan Pollok Tjoeglik, in accordance to the Balinese Adat (a semi-official local tradition).
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1942The Japanese occupy the Dutch East Indies, and heavily bomb the coastal areas along the island.
Le Mayeur’s works are safely transported and stored in a shed, for the duration of the terrors.
Unlike other Dutch artists like W.G. Hofker or Rudolf Bonnet who were interned, Le Mayeur is instead placed under house arrest. -
1956Indonesia’s Minister of Education and Culture, Mr. Bahder Djohan visits Sanur, and offers to preserve Le Mayeur’s house as an official museum. This was confirmed when the “Deed of Conveyance nr. 38” was signed.
Le Mayeur conveys all of his possessions as a gift to his wife, Ni Pollok, through the signing of the “Deed of Conveyance nr. 37”. -
1958Le Mayeur is diagnosed with ear cancer.
He arrives in Brussels in April of 1958 and is accompanied by Pollok and his niece, Nicole, who had spent eighteen months with the couple in Bali.
His health quickly deteriorates. The artist eventually passes away on the 31st of May in Brussels.
"Except for a few journeys in the Far East, I never left the island. Why should I? Sir, I am an impressionist. There are three things in life that I love. Beauty, sunlight and silence. Now could you tell me where to find these in a more perfect state than in Bali?"