Mucha's Slav Epic in Moravský Krumlov

Most foreign visitors to the Czech Republic will come to recognize the artwork of Alfons Mucha from the many postcards and posters on sale around the centre of Prague and other Bohemian tourist precincts.

Mucha's masterpiece though is not printed on a calendar, a set of beer coasters or a bookmark. It's not even in the Mucha Museum on Prague's Panská ulice. The works of art to which the artist dedicated the best part of his later life are at the other end of the country, in the dim ballrooms and ceremonial halls of the crumbling Moravský Krumlov chateau, just a few kilometres from Mucha's hometown of Ivančice.

Born in July 1860, the young Alfons Mucha soon showed natural talent for music and art. He completed high school in Brno but was refused admittance to Prague's Academy of Art for apparent lack of talent. After moving to Vienna his skills were quickly appreciated and he progressed to a school of graphic arts in Munich and then to Paris, eventually finishing his studies in 1889.

1890's Paris was the epicentre of the art nouveau movement and Mucha's elegant theatre posters and designs earned wide respect. Despite his renown, Mucha left Paris for lack of money and travelled to the United States where he taught painting and sculpture, married, and gained the enduring patronage of wealthy Slavophile Charles Crane.

With Crane's support, Mucha returned to his homeland in 1910, set up studio in a chateau and spent the best part of the next two decades visually recounting the history of the Slavic peoples. Mucha's sublime brushwork follows the Slavic peoples from their original homeland beside the Goths and Huns, through the major stages of their early history, right up to events occurring in his lifetime. The 20th Century collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire brought the independence of Slavic nations like the Serbs, Slovaks, Bohemians and Mucha's own Moravians and forms the subject for the final canvas of the epic series.

The aging Mucha bequeathed the Slav Epic to the Czechoslovakian people and their capital city at the time, Prague, on the condition that an adequate home was found of them and they were accessible to the public. The canvasses were exhibited briefly after their completion, but during the Nazi occupation were hidden in several locations and suffered damage from dampness. Mucha died in Prague on 14th July 1939 from the results of an interrogation by the Gestapo.

In the 1950's the canvasses were brought to the chateau at Moravský Krumlov and restored by a team including Mucha's daughter Jaroslava. From 1963 to 1967 the paintings were progressively returned to public exhibition in the chateau halls and there they have stayed.

In recent years Prague's bureaucrats seem to have remembered the Slav Epic and comprehended the potential it holds for their city's tourism industry. The few abortive attempts at finding a home for the Slav Epic in the city so far have been characterized by treatment of the great artwork as a commodity and a laughable lack of results.

Unfortunately there was no time limit in the artist's will, but my guess is that he didn't intend for his masterpiece to be ignored for the best part of a century and then shuffled into the capital at the first chance of making a quick buck. Mucha's descendants apparently intend to launch legal action to determine the true owner of the canvasses, in light of the fact that the city of Prague has (for seven decades) failed to fulfill the stipulations for ownership of the artworks. Whether the family's intention is to pressure for the city to finally take some action or actually gain ownership for themselves is unclear.

As the situation stands now, the Slav Epic remains in South Moravia on a year-by year basis, which makes it difficult for the chateau authorities to finance repairs and improvements while their only source of income could evaporate at any moment.

The Slav Epic in the chateau at Moravský Krumlov is open to the public from April through October but closes for an hour at lunchtime and all day on Mondays. By public transport, Moravský Krumlov is four hours from Prague, three from Vienna and an hour or less from either Brno or Znojmo. There's accommodation in Krumlov itself, but given the choice I'd prompt for spending the night in nearby Znojmo.

A visit to the Slav Epic is quite a special thing and the only people who go are those who really want to see it. Somehow I don't think it's going to be the same when it gets to the big city.

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