Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting photos

4  Easter Chimes Awaken Nature 1896 print
4  F Champenois Imprimeur-Editeur 1897 55.2x72.7cm
4  Flirt 1899 30x64.2cm calendar
4  Flower 1897 44.4x66.2cm litho
4 Mucha Alphonse Fruit 1897 44.4x66.2cm litho by paintings from photo to oil painting reproduction
4  Gismonda 1894 74.2x216cm
4  Hamlet 1899 76.5x205.7cm 
4  Head of a Girl
4  Iris
4 Mucha Alphonse Jaroslava 1920 73x60cm by paintings from photo to oil painting reproduction
4  JOB 1896 59x173cm
4 La Dame aux Camelias 1896 72.2x207.3cm
4  La Samarataine 1897 58.3x173cm

4  Lance-Parfum Rodo 1896 32x44.5cm
4 Mucha Alphonse Lefevre-Utile 1903 53x72cm by paintings from photo to oil painting reproduction
4  Lorenzaccio 1896 73x203.7cm
4  Manhood 1897 21.5x29.9cm calendar
4  Maria Portrait Of Milada Cerny 
4  Maria Young Girl In A Moravian Costume 
4 Mucha Alphonse Maud Adams as Joan of Arc by paintings from photo to oil painting reproduction
4  Medee 1898 76x206cm
4  Moet and Chandon Cremant Imperial 1899 23x60.8cm
4  Moet and Chandon White Star 1899 23x60.8cm
4  Monaco Monte Carlo 1897 74.5x108cm litho
4 Mucha Alphonse Moravian Teachers Choir 1911 79.5x108.5cm by paintings from photo to oil painting reproduction
4  Morning Star 1902 23.5x59cm litho
4  Nestles Food for Infants 1897 34.5x72cm
4  North Star 1902 56x21.7cm pencil wash
4  Perfecta Cycles 1902 104.3x154.6cm

Alphonse Maria Mucha
Czechoslovakian Art Nouveau printmaker & painter
born 1860 - died 1939

Also known as: Alfons Marie Mucha, Alphonse Marie Mucha.

Teacher of: Roman Kryzanovsky (1885-1929), Clara Weaver Parrish (1861-1925)

Alphonse (Alfons) Mucha (1860-1939) was a prolific Moravian painter of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries and a key figure in the Art Nouveau movement. His style of painting influenced an entire generation of painters, graphic artists, draughtsmen and designers and in the minds of many, his work epitomizes the Art Nouveau. Alphonse Maria Mucha himself came to resent his fame as an artist of the utilitarian, believing that true art should be elevated and epic.

Alfons Mucha was born on July 24, 1860, in the town of Ivancice, Moravia, then part of Austro-Hungary. His father was a court usher, and the family had but modest means. The future painter was raised in an atmosphere of strict Roman Catholicism, and this would later be reflected in the symbolism Alphonse Maria Mucha employed in his work.

In 1871, Mucha joined the choir at St. Peter's Cathedral in Brno, where Alphonse Maria Mucha was attending grammar school. Alphonse Maria Mucha pursued singing seriously for a while, but was forced to abandon it after his voice started cracking in 1875. Instead, Mucha took up drawing lessons. Soon afterwards, Alphonse Maria Mucha returned to Ivancice where, in the meanwhile, Alphonse Maria Mucha found work as a municipal clerk.

In 1877, the young man applied to the Academy of Visual Art in Prague, but was unable to gain admission. This did not discourage him, however, and Alphonse Maria Mucha continued attending drawing classes. In 1879, Alphonse Maria Mucha got a job in Vienna as an assistant in a firm that made stage sets, which is where Alphonse Maria Mucha gained familiarity with theatre and the art of interior decoration. Alphonse Maria Mucha was laid off in 1882, after a fire in the Burg Theater -- where the company had been working -- put the firm in difficult financial straits.- Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting photos- Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting from photo – photo to oil painting Mucha Alphonse Bio by oil paintings from photos supplier of Mucha oil painting from photo.

At this point, Mucha was feeling confident enough in his artistic skills to take up portrait painting. Alphonse Maria Mucha moved back to Moravia, to the town of Mikulov, and it was there that Alphonse Maria Mucha met Count Karl Khuen-Belassi, a local nobleman, who commissioned him to decorate the Emmahof Castle. The Count was so impressed with Mucha's work that Alphonse Maria Mucha agreed to sponsor the artist's formal education. In 1884, after touring northern Italy and Austria with his patron, the painter entered the Academy of Visual Art in Milan.

While at the Academy, Mucha became chairman of the Association of Slavic Painters, a first sure sign of his patriotic views.

In 1888, Mucha visited Paris for the first time. Paris, Europe's undisputed artistic capital of the time, was an essential step in the education of any "serious" painter. Mucha studied at the Academie Julian and the Academie Colarossi, focusing on academic historical painting. Alphonse Maria Mucha was also involved with the Symbolists and artistic circles close to them.

Although Alphonse Maria Mucha was a technically adept painter, academic art was long past its peak of popularity, and, as a means of supporting himself, Mucha began to draw illustrations for books and magazines.

In 1892, the painter designed his first advertising poster. Finding this line of work profitable, Alphonse Maria Mucha began taking regular commissions and, in 1894, Alphonse Maria Mucha designed a poster for the show "Gismonda" of the highly popular stage actress Sarah Bernhardt. The poster was revolutionary, bringing unheard of innovations to the art of poster-printing, which had hitherto consisted of large amounts of text with a few simple illustrations, usually in just one or two colors. The Gismonda poster (1892) employed a radically new vertical format -- a legacy of which we can see in posters today -- and an unheard-of amount of colors and detail.

For Mucha, who had been a nearly unknown artist up to this point, this was a breakthrough. Sarah Bernhardt was so impressed with his work that she immediately offered the artist an exclusive six-year contract. The posters that Mucha produced for her include: La Dame aux Camelias (1896), Lorenzaccio (1896), La Samaritaine (1897), Medee (1898), Hamlet (1899) and Tosca (1899). During this time, Alphonse Maria Mucha was also responsible for the stage sets and costumes at the Theatre de la Renaissance, where Bernhardt worked.- Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting photos- Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting from photo – photo to oil painting Mucha Alphonse Bio by oil paintings from photos supplier of Mucha oil painting from photo.

In 1896, Mucha designed his first panneaux decoratifs: The Seasons (1896). Panneaux decoratifs were limited-edition large-size prints executed on silk or stiff papers, often ornately framed, hung on walls or screens. Usually, these featured highly stylized nature scenes, inspired by the silk screen paintings of the Orient. Mucha would produce several series of these, including: Flowers (1898), the Art (1898), the Months (1899), Gemstones (1900) and Stars (1901).

Although the painter thought of his Art Nouveau work as scarcely more than a means of earning money to enable him to pursue more serious things, critics thought differently. In 1897, the painter had his first one-man exhibition at the Galerie La Bodiniere. Later that year, a second, much larger exhibition was held at the Salon de Cent, and proceeded to tour Europe.

In 1898, the painter was invited to teach drawing lessons at the Academie Carmen. Alphonse Maria Mucha accepted.

That summer, deciding to take a break from Paris and his daily work on posters and illustrations, the artist went abroad to visit Spain and then the Balkan states.

It was at around this time that Mucha began his collaboration with the known Parisian jeweler Georges Fouquet. Together, they created a number of pieces featuring Mucha's trademark style. The painter also designed the façade and interior of Fouquet's shop, giving the jeweller's boutique an extravagant, almost temple-like setting.

In 1902, with interest in Art Nouveau beginning to wane, Mucha travelled to his homeland, visiting Moravia and Prague. To him, his Art Noveau work had been something frivolous and unimportant, so Alphonse Maria Mucha was not particularly disappointed that it had fallen out of fashion. In fact, this was only to be expected, for Alphonse Maria Mucha believed that the only "true" art was academic. It was during his 1902 trip home that the artist became infected with the idea of painting a series of epic patriotic works, showing the somewhat fictionalized history of the Slavic people in a grand, neo-classical style.- Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting photos- Mucha Alphonse Maria Czechoslovakia oil painting from photo – photo to oil painting Mucha Alphonse Bio by oil paintings from photos supplier of Mucha oil painting from photo.

In 1904, Alphonse Maria Mucha made a brief visit to the USA, in the hopes of raising additional money. Alphonse Maria Mucha picked up portrait commissions and also lectured in New York, Philadelphia and Chicago. Soon, Alphonse Maria Mucha returned to Europe and began preparations for what Alphonse Maria Mucha would consider his own greatest work.

In 1906, Mucha married Maria Chytilova, a fellow Moravian whom Alphonse Maria Mucha had met in Paris.

Over the following years, Alphonse Maria Mucha devoted himself to painting the Slavic Epic, a series of twenty monumental canvasses. This project consumed so much of his time and energy that the once-extremely popular artist fell into near obscurity during this period.

Though Mucha considered this to be the most meaningful work of his life, the paintings were received rather coldly by the European public, due to changing tastes and also probably to the First World War, raging at the time. The New World accepted them rather more enthusiastically, when part of the Slavic Epic was exhibited in New York in 1921. However, the paintings were never nearly as successful as Mucha's early Art Nouveau works.

The titles of oil painting old master Alphonse Maria Mucha