Adolf Heinrich Lier

At the age of fifteen (after a problematic youth that included three years in a reformatory)[1] he expressed a desire to be a painter but his father opposed the idea, sending him instead to the construction tradeschools in Zittau and Dresden to study draftsmanship.

[2] In 1848, he received a commission to help prepare designs for a museum ceiling in Basel, under the direction of Melchior Berri.

After failing to obtain a position in the studios of Joseph Karl Stieler, he encountered Richard Zimmermann, who he knew from Zittau, and became his pupil.

This confirmed him in his belief that landscapes should be natural, focus on overall effect rather than detail, and be what one might now call "deceptively simple".

[2] Hoping to find some rest and recovery, he planned to spend the winter of 1882 in the South Tyrol, but died of a heart attack shortly after arriving.