Alphonse Mucha
It is so easy to focus solely on the artist when we talk about art. But today I want to start with the model, who was in this case also the artist's assistant and daughter. Jaroslava was born in 1909 in New York, when her parents were visiting the USA for a fundraising event. She first studied ballet, but then started to assist her famous father Alfons Maria Mucha. Alfons later used her portrait on the very first Czechoslovak ten koruna banknote. By the 1920's Alfons had flourishing studio. Born in 1860 in Ivancice, Moravia (currently Czech territory). He stormed the world of art with his highly commercial Jugendstil posters. He quickly recognised that photography could be of great help;he often tried out and recorded poses which later appeared in his art.
When the “De Forest Phonofilm” commissioned an advertising poster in 1927, Alfons asked his daughter Jaroslava to pose for/with him—and he made this photograph. When I first saw it I was slightly amused. We see this older man in a photographer's coat. Looking... agitated, fluttered and in a hurry. His left hand on the breast of a young woman, who touches the man's hand slightly. Her gesture is more theatrical, opening her stance and throwing her right arm wide. Eyes closed, she looks like enjoying herself. Now if you hadn't had all this background information, what would you think? We then switch to the poster Alfons made, using the photograph as a template. The parallels are obvious. I even thought how the hands of the person in the back appear to be large (male-like) for such a petite figure. Alfons died in 1939 and after the second world war Jaroslava tried to save her father's major project 'Slavanska epopej'— twenty large canvases depicting Czech mythology. Alfons had used her as a model for several figures. Jaroslava died in 1986.
- Erik
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