Editing Alphonse Mucha (section)

{{short description|Czech painter, illustrator and graphic artist (1860–1939)}}
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{{Infobox artist
| name          = Alphonse Mucha
| image         = Alfons Mucha in Studio (c. 1899).jpg
| caption       = Mucha in his studio ({{Circa|1899}})
| birth_name     = Alfons Maria Mucha
| birth_date     = {{Birth date|1860|07|24|df=y}}
| birth_place    = [[Ivančice]], [[Margraviate of Moravia]], [[Austrian Empire]]
| death_date     = {{death date and age|1939|07|14|1860|07|24|df=y}}
| death_place    = [[Prague]], [[Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia]]
| field         = Painting, illustration, decorative art, architecture 
| training      = [[Munich Academy of Fine Arts]]<br />{{lang|fr|[[Académie Julian]]|italic=no}}<br />[[Académie Colarossi]]
| movement      = [[Art Nouveau]]
| works         = ''[[The Slav Epic]]'' (''Slovanská epopej'')
| awards        = Legion of Honor (France), Knight of the Order of Franz Joseph I (Austria)
| module = 
{{Infobox person | embed = yes
| signature          = Alfons_Mucha_signature_from_letter.svg
| signature_size     = 
| signature_alt      = 
}}
}}

'''Alfons Maria Mucha'''<ref>[http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/grove/art/T060126?q=mucha&hbutton_search.x=0&hbutton_search.y=0&hbutton_search=search&source=oao_gao&source=oao_t118&source=oao_t234&source=oao_t4&search=quick&pos=1&_start=1#firsthit "Mucha, Alphonse"], [[Grove Dictionary of Art]] Online. Retrieved 3 October 2009.{{Subscription required}}</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=-npAm56mDFgC&pg=PA244 ''New Town''], Frommers Eastern Europe, p. 244. Retrieved 8 October 2009.</ref> ({{IPA|cs|ˈalfons ˈmuxa|lang|Cs-Alfons Mucha.ogg}}; 24 July 1860 – 14 July 1939),<ref name="OUP">{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HFExDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT891 |page=891 |title=The Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists |author=Ian Chilvers |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2017|isbn=9780191024177 }}</ref> known internationally as '''Alphonse Mucha''', was a Czech painter, illustrator, and graphic artist. Living in Paris during the [[Art Nouveau]] period, he was widely known for his distinctly stylized and decorative theatrical posters, particularly those of [[Sarah Bernhardt]].<ref name=obit>{{Cite news |title=Mucha, Noted Artist, Dropped First Name; Death Due To Shock Caused By Germans' Seizure Of Prague. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1939/07/18/archives/mucha-noted-artist-dropped-first-name-death-due-to-shock-caused-by.html |quote=The artist Mucha—he always signed his work without his given name, which he preferred to ignore—died here ... |work=The New York Times |date=18 July 1939 |access-date=20 April 2008 |url-access=subscription }}</ref> He produced illustrations, advertisements, decorative panels, as well as designs, which became among the best-known images of the period.{{Sfn|Thiébaut|2018|pages=64–77}}

In the second part of his career, at the age of 57, he returned to his homeland and devoted himself to a series of twenty monumental symbolist canvases known as ''[[The Slav Epic]]'', depicting the history of all the [[Slavic peoples]] of the world,<ref name="OUP"/> which he painted between 1912 and 1926. In 1928, on the 10th anniversary of the [[Czechoslovak declaration of independence|independence of Czechoslovakia]], he presented the series to the Czech nation. He considered it his most important work.