"[2] In addition, he had little taste for master-apprentice relations and no sooner had he mastered an art form than he was flouting the conventions of the genre.
[2][3] For example, there is a story of him as an adolescent learning Traditional Burmese floral painting from a Mandalay master and being able to reproduce such designs, of a high quality, in the space of a single session.
However, in the 1990s, unusual works by Ba Thet began to emerge in Burma that indicated he was much bored with this watercolor style and was searching for a more adventuresome form of painting.
The Mandalay painter and art dealer Myo Khin has described Ba Thet's path as one of rebellion against the "Royal Academy Style", meaning British watercolor painting.
Such works have made characterizing Ba Thet's oeuvre very difficult, for it is full of odd leaps and jumps.