Sarah Bernhardt and Alphonse Mucha

La Dame aux Camelias
Originally uploaded by aeillill

What a Pair of Artists!


Few people know that it was Sarah Bernhardt who helped advance Mucha and his "decorative" Art Nouveau. She commissioned him to do a poster for Gismonde and once she saw it, she immediately signed him to a five-year contract to design her posters, costumes and even her sets. Once this information got out, Mucha was "the toast of Paris". He remained in demand for two decades. He designed furniture and jewelry as well. He recognized, however, that his work would be outmoded after a time and concentrated on his supreme artistic love: painting "The Slav Epic." It consists of about 12 vast canvases. He continued to do public art in Prague, (e.g. a stained glass window for St. Vitus Cathedral), but his heart was never far from "The Epic". It is shown completely in his little home town, Ivancice, Moravia.


Picture of Mucha, dwarfed by his "Slav Epic"