"Sägewerk bei Kuchl", Werner Otte, 1977.
Found at http://www.askart.com/askart/o/werner_otte/werner_otte.aspx
Hoping for kind permission to use the reproduction in loving memory of a great artist.
It's a saw-mill near a small village in the lime stone range of the Northern Alps, Kuchl, some 25 miles south of Salzburg city. But the light in this almost sketch-like water colour, the light could be the light of the Mediterranean that Otte loved so much. There are drawings of a quarry near Baska, Krk, Croatia that give you the same feeling.
Otte was not just a painter, he was a craftsman; he knew how to handle wood, stone, and metal: in order to not just design huge concrete glass windows but to actually make them he taught himself to weld the steel reinforcements; he learned how to split rather than cut the heavy coloured glass panes.
So, when he did a sketch of a quarry or a saw-mill it was not what a still life might be for many an artist; Otte could have worked there, he did not mind hard physical labour, he loved to use his hands.
At the moment, 13 years after his death, his work may not be very present in the market, but it is in the hearts of all those who knew him.
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