Saturday, September 25, 2010

Tadanori Yokoo (横尾忠則, Yoko-o Tadanori)

Tadanori Yokoo (横尾忠則, Yoko-o Tadanori) (born 1936, 27 June in Hyogo Prefecture) is a Japanese graphic designer, illustrator, printmaker and painter.

Tadanori Yokoo, born in Nishiwaki, Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan, in 1936, is one of Japan's most successful and internationally recognized graphic designers and artists. He began his career as a stage designer for avant garde theatre in Tokyo. His early work shows the influence of the New York based Push Pin Studio (Milton Glaser and Seymour Chwast in particular) but Yokoo himself cites filmmaker Akira Kurosawa and writer Yukio Mishima as two of his most formative influences.

In the late 1960s he became interested in mysticism and psychedelia, deepened by travels in India. Because his work was so attuned to 1960s pop culture, he has often been (unfairly) described as the "Japanese Andy Warhol" or likened to psychedelic poster artist Peter Max, but Yokoo's complex and multi-layered imagery is intensely autobiographical and entirely original. By the late 60s he had already achieved international recognition for his work and was included in the 1968 "Word & Image" exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Four years later MoMA mounted a solo exhibition of his graphic work organized by Mildred Constantine.[1]Shuji Terayama and his theater Tenjo Sajiki. He has also starred as a protagonist in Nagisa Oshima's film Diary of a Shinjuku Thief. Yokoo collaborated extensively with

In 1981 he unexpectedly "retired" from commercial work and took up painting. His career as a fine artist continues to this day with numerous exhibitions of his paintings every year, but alongside this he remains fully engaged and prolific as a graphic designer.

Found Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadanori_Yokoo

Yokoo Tadanori began producing posters while attending high school in his hometown of Nishiwaki. Then, following stints at the Kobe Shimbun newspaper, the National Advertising Research Center, and after moving to Tokyo in 1960, the Nippon Design Center, Yokoo joined the Japan Advertising Artists Club at the tender age of 22.

In the mid-60s, through his relationships with Juro Kara and Shuji Terayama, Yokoo suddenly rose to prominence through works such as Koshi-maki Osen and La Marie Vison. At the same time, his illustrations for magazines such as Heibon Punch and Hanashi no Tokushu made him a darling of the media.

Yokoo's posters, which while reflecting post-war Japanese society, have been burned into our brains as unforgettable memories of the era. They are also notable for the fact that rather than following foreign trends, they display a unique sense of Japanese graphic design.

Yokoo's creative activities later expanding to include a wide range of fields such as painting and literature, but as he continued to produce posters throughout his career, the poster format functions as the core of his work as an artist.

In this exhibition, we present over 800 posters from the museum's collection along with invaluable documents from the artist's private collection in a full-scale introduction to Yokoo's overwhelming body of creative work that stretches over half a century.

Found Here: http://www.nmao.go.jp/english/b3_exhi_beginning_yokoo.html

(b Nishiwaki, Hyogo Prefect., 1936). Japanese stage designer, printmaker and painter. In 1960 he went to Tokyo and began his career as a stage designer. He was responsible for the design of such avant-garde drama as the Situation Theatre (Jokyo Gekijo) of Juro Kara (b 1940) and the Upper Gallery (Tenjo Sajiki) of Shuji Terayama (1935-83). He also produced prints and in 1967 exhibited works in the Word and Image exhibition at MOMA, New York. Although he used photographs as the basis of his designs, Yokoo's prints drew upon aspects of traditional Japanese woodcuts that coincided with the style of contemporary Pop art, using in particular flat areas of colour and overtly sexual subject-matter (e.g. X-sex IV, screenprint, 1968; priv. col., see Yokoo, 1990, p. 13). In addition to his activity as a commercial designer, from the late 1960s he became interested in mysticism and psychedelic art, influenced in particular by travels in India in the 1970s. He produced posters with eclectic imagery similar to that of contemporary psychedelic 'underground' magazines. In 1980 he unexpectedly took up painting, prompted by a large-scale travelling exhibition of Picasso's work that he saw in New York. He painted in an expressionistic figurative style works that appeared in stage productions for Yukio Mishima (1925-70) and in productions of operas by Richard Wagner.

Found Here: http://www.answers.com/topic/tadanori-yokoo

1936 Born in Hyogo Prefecture
1956 Nominated as member of Nissenbi(JAAC)Japan Advertising Artists Club
1960 Enters Nippon Design Center (NDC)
1964 Forms Studio "Ilfil"
1965 Participates in "Persona" exhibition (Matsuya Ginza)

Receives Mainichi Industrial Design Award
1966 Solo Exhibition (Nantenshi Gallery, Tokyo)
1968 Participates in "Word and Image" exhibition (MoMA, New York)
1969 Solo Exhibition (Tokyo Gallery)

Participates in "A Prospect of Modern Design in Japan" exhibition (The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto)

Awarded the Grand Prize for Prints at 6th Paris Youth Biennale

Participates in "18 Artists of Contemporary Prints" exhibition (Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art)

1970 Participates in Exhibition "Human Documents '70" (Tokyo Gallery)

Solo Exhibition (Matsuya Ginza, Kyoto, Kobe, Sapporo,Nagoya etc.)

Art-directs the Fiber Pavilion of Osaka Exposition
1971 "Chronicle of Art after World War II" Exhibition (Kanagawa Museum of Modern Art)

"The 10th Contemporary Art of Japan Exhibition" (Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art)

"100 Artists in Art Today" (Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Modern Art)

1972 Solo Exhibition (MoMA, New York)

Receives the UNESCO Award of the 4th International Poster Biennale in Warsaw

Wins the Special prize in the 5th International Graphic design Biennale in Brno

Participates in "Print Art" Exhibition (Philadelphia Museum of Art)
1973 "Contemporary Art of Japan: A Panorama of Contemporary Japan Art in 20 years"(Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum/Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art)

"Graphic Image '73" (Tokyo Central Museum / The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto)

Solo Exhibition (Museum fur Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg)

Participates in Tour Exhibition in America "Contemporary Japan Prints"
(Museum of Fine Arts Boston/New York Culture Center)

Receives the Judge's Committee Prize of "Contemporary Japan Prints" (London ICA)

Wins the Grand Prize of Tokyo ADC
1974 Solo Exhibition (Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam)

"The 11th Japan International Art Exhibition"(Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum/Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art)

"Graphic design Image '74" (Tokyo Central Museum/The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto)

Receives the prize of Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Modern Art in the 9th International Print Art Biennale in Tokyo

Participates at the exhibition "Japan: Tradition and Contemporary" (Stadtmuseum, D us seldorf)

"Japanese Contemporary Prints" (Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico)

Wins the Gold Prize of the 5th International Poster Biennale in Warsaw

Wins the Silver Prize of the 6th International Graphic Design Biennale in Brno
1975 Awarded the 20th Mainichi Design Award

"The 11th Contemporary Art in Japan Exhibition"(Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum/Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art)

"Japanese Print Arts in 1975" Exhibition (Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Arts)

"A Panorama of Contemporary Art in Japan" (Seibu Museum of Art, Tokyo)

"5 Japanese Graphic designers" (Musee cantonal des Beaux-Arts Lausanne/The National Museum of Contemporary Art, Oslo)
1976 Participates in Exhibition of "5 International Graphic Designers" at Venice Biennial
1977 "Contemporary Japanese Poster Exhibition" (Museu de Arte de Sao Paulo)

"The Past 10 years' Japanese Poster" (Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam)
1978 Wins the Merit Prize of The 7th International Poster Biennale in Warsaw

Awarded Kodansha Publishing Cultural Award for Binding
1979 Participates in '79 Art Festival in Tokyo (Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum)

"Japanese Poster Exhibition" (Musee de la Publicite, Paris)

Wins 2000 Fmk Prize of the 3rd International Poster Biennial in Lahti
1980 Solo Exhibition (Okayama Art Museum)

Exhibits "Japan Style" (Victoria & Albert Museum, London)

"Japan-Poster" Exhibition (Museum of Modern Art, Vienna)
1981 Converted from a graphic designer to a painter

"World Contemporary Print in the 25 years"(Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum / Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Art/Hiroshima Prefectural Art Museum)

"A turning Point of Contemporary Art in 60's Japan"(The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo/The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto)
1982 Solo Exhibition (Museum fur Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg)

Solo Exhibition (Nantenshi Gallery, Tokyo)
1983 Solo Exhibition ( Otani Memorial Art Museum,Nishinomiya city)

Solo Exhibition (Musee de la Publicite, Paris)

Participates in "A Tendency of Contemporary Art in Japan part 2: Departure to Diversity"(Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum)
1984 Art-directs the stage decoration for Ballet "DIONYSOS", Belgique 20thCentury Ballet, produced by Maurice Bejart and Scara Theatre, MilanoSolo Exhibition (Otis Persons Gallery, Los Angeles)

"The 20th Century Posters: Avant-garde" at Walker Art Center, Minneapolis)

"The 2nd Toyama International Contemporary Art Exhibition" (The Museum of Modern Art, Toyama)

"A Panorama of Contemporary Art in Japan ム Graphic Art & Design"
(The Museum of Modern Art, Toyama)
1985 Invited works at The 13th Paris Biennale

Participates in The 18th Sao Paulo International Biennale

Solo Exhibition (Pallazzo Bianco, Genova)

Solo Exhibition (Farcone Theatre, Genova)

Solo Exhibition (Kunstlerhause Bethanien, Berlin)

"The 1st representational painting Biennale" (The Museum of Modern Art, Kanagawa)

"Contemporary Self-portrait" (The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama)

"Contemporary Art in 40 years" (Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum)

"1985: Japanese Prints" (Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Arts)
1986 Enters in "The 9th British International Print Biennale"

"Tokyo: Form and Spirit" (Walker Art Center, Minneapolis/The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles/IBM Gallery, New York/The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art)

"Japanese Avant-Garde 1910-1970" Exhibition (Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris)

"A Current of Contemporary Art in Japan: painting Part 1" (The Museum of Modern Art, Toyama)

Solo Exhibition (Roberta English Gallery, San Francisco)

Solo Exhibition (Israel Museum, Jerusalem)

Solo Exhibition (Roy Boyd Gallery, Los Angeles)

Exhibits "Art and Simplicity" (Setagaya Art Museum / Tochigi Prefectural Museum of Fine Art)
1987 Solo Exhibition (The Seibu Museum of Art, Tokyo)

Solo Exhibition (Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh)

"Selection of the Frederick R. Weisman Foundation Collection of Art"(Pennsylvania, and several places in USA)

"Icons in Contemporary Art" (The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama)

Receives Hyogo Prefecture Cultural Award
1988 Solo Exhibition (Galerie Silvia Menzel, Berlin)

"The Modern Posters" (MoMA, New York)

Participates in "Art Kite" tour Japan, the U.S., and Europe in a traveling exhibition (The Miyagi Museum of Art)

"Human Image in Modern Art" (The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo)
1989 Receives Honorary Prize of The 4th ASIA Art Biennale, Bangladesh

"The 19th Contemporary Japan-Art" Exhibition (Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum/Kyoto City Art Museum etc.)

"ARTIS '89 An international image for human and citizens' rights"(Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris)

"Contemporary Japanese Poster" Exhibition (MoMA, New York)
1990 Designs the plans of pavilion and garden for the Central American nation of Belize at Expo '90

The International Garden and Greenery Exposition held in Osaka

Participates in "Excellent Works in Modern Japanese Art: Zidai-wo-tsuranuku-bi" (Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Modern Art)

"Fantasy and Power: From Japanese Modern and Contemporary Art" (The Miyagi Museum of Art)
1991 Solo Exhibition (Sagacho Exhibit Space)

Exhibits in "Maniera-no-Kosaten: Contemporary Prints and Image Expression" (Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts)

"Beyond Japan: A Photo Theatre" (Barbican Art Gallery, London)

"Contemporary Japanese Graphic Design" (Design Museum, London)
1992 Exhibits in "Japan's Pop art 1960s" (Fukui Fine Arts Museum)

"Adam and Eve: 10th Anniversary Exhibition" (The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama)

"3 Japanese Poster Artists" (Tel Aviv Museum of Art)
1993 Participates in "45th Venice Biennale Trans-Actions" Venice, Italy

"International Poster Exhibition" (Tel Aviv Museum of Art)
1994 "Avant-garde Art in the Post War Japan"(Yokohama Museum of Art/ Guggenheim Museum SOHO, New York)

"Japanese Design" (Philadelphia Museum of Art)

"Art Today 1994" (Sezon Museum of Modern Art)

"The Pop Image Prints and Multiples" (Marlborough Gallery, New York)

Solo Exhibition (Contemporary Art Center, New Orleans)
1995 Receives the Mainichi Fine Art Award

Participates in "Sengo Bunka no Kiseki 1945-1995" (Japanese Culture:The Fifty Post-war Years)

(Meguro Museum of Art, Tokyo / Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art / Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Modern Art / Fukuoka Prefectural Museum of Art)

The 1st Performance Poster International Triennial, Sophia (Bulgaria National Museum of Art)

Solo Exhibition (Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography)

"Today's Art" (Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark)
1996 Solo Exhibition (Nantenshi Gallery, Tokyo)

"1960's Avant-garde Art in the Post War Japan" (Kurashiki City Art Museum)
1997 Solo Exhibition (Kirin Plaza, Osaka)

Solo Exhibition (Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Modern Art/ The Museum of Modern Art, Kanagawa)

Wins the Gold Prize of New York ADC Award

Publication. "The thing which cannot watch the thing which I see". A Chikuma library

Publication. "Return - Tadanori Yokoo Museum 1966-1997 to me." Hyogo Prefctural museum of art / Kanagawa prefectural Museum of Modern Art

Publication. "Asahi Museum - Tadanori Yokoo." Asahi Shimbun

Publication. "28 world graphic design - Tadanori Yokoo." King the graphic gallery

Publication. "Art of masterpiece response." I am pleased with a present of God. Kobunsha library

Publication. "I and intuition and an alien"(in the sky and the ground, similar figure - changes a title). Bunshun library

Publication. "Tokyo farewell look requiem." Asahi Shimbun

Publication. "A Yokoo's kissho-shofuku poster exhibition." (A fortune)Okanoyama Museum of art Nishiwaki
1998 Publication. "Tadanori Yokoo." In the days of a thing of red. (A fortune)Okanoyama Museum of art Nishiwaki

Publication. "A Yokoo's kissho-shofuku postcard book." Heibonsha Publishers Ltd.

Publication. "A collection of secret - Tadanori Yokoo talks to live now." Kobunsha library

Publication. "I lived in a flash in a friend". (Art is a love - change of the title). Kobunsha library

Publication. To "disturbance ! ". (Tadanori Yokoo autobiography - change of the title). Sentence spring library
1999

Exhibits in "Hyojo-han-hyojo: Prints in Japan 1945-1999" (Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts)


Solo Exhibition (Communications Museum, Tokyo)

"Ground Zero Japan" (Contemporary Art Gallery, Art Tower Mito)
2000 Solo Exhibition (Museum "Eki" Kyoto)

Elected to the Hall of the Hall of Fame, New York ADC
2001 Exhibits in "MoMA Highlights" (MoMA, New York)

"Century City ム Fine Arts and Culture of Contemporary City" (Tate Modern, London)

Solo Exhibition (The Museum of Modern Art, Toyama)

Solo Exhibition (Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo)

Purple Ribbon Medal
2002 Professor for Postgraduate course of Tama Art University (March 2004)

Participates in "Pop! Pop!! Pop!!!" (The Museum of Modern Art, Ibaraki)

Solo Exhibition (Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Contemporary Art / Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art)

Awarded the ICOGRADA Special Prize of the 20th International Graphic Design Biennale in Brno
2003 Solo Exhibition (The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto)

Awarded the Slovakia Design Center Prize of the 5th 2003 Trnava Poster Exhibition (Slovakia)

Solo Exhibition (Fukuoka Art Museum)

Solo Exhibition (Entwistle Gallery, London)
2004 Directs the theatrical Arts and costume of public performance "King and Dragon : author Takeshi Umehara" in France

Wins the Silver prize of New York ADC

Exhibition "TAKARAZUKA: the Land of Dreams" (Suntory Museum, Tenpozan / Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery)

"Remaking modernism in Japan 1900-2000"(Museum of Contemporary Art,Tokyo / The University Art Museum-Tokyo National University of Fine Arts & Music)

Solo Exhibition (Miyazaki Prefectural Art Museum)

Solo Exhibition (SCAI the Bathhouse,Tokyo)

"Marcel Duchamp and the 20th Century Art" (The National Museum of Art,Osaka)

Received the Dark-blue Ribbon Medal from the Japanese Government

Directed the theatrical Art of "Takarazuka Dream Kingdam" by Takarazuka girls' operetta company

Produced the Rapping design for Electric Trains of JR Kakogawa-line

Received the International Jury Prize of The 3rd International Poster Biennial,Ningbo 2004 (China)
2005 Solo Exhibition (Contemporary Art Museum, Kumamoto)

Solo Exhibition (Ikeda Museum of 20th Century Art)

Solo Exhibition (Nantenshi Gallery, Tokyo)

Wins the Grand Prize of the 15th International Poster Biennial in Lahti

ISSEY MIYAKE PARIS COLLECTIONS 1977-1999: Invitations by Tadanori "Yokoo" (The Museum of Modern Art, Toyama)


The Last Exhibition of Parallelism in Art (Espace OHARA)
2006 Solo Exhibition (Fondation Cartier pour I' art contemporain ,Paris )

New Acquisition Contemporary Art and The Humor(Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art)

"Dream, Rousseau whom Rousseau watched dream to watch" (Setagaya art museum)

Winning Japanese culture design grand prix
2007 "art / nonart / nonart 1950-1970" exhibition(J.Paulgetty Museum, Los Angeles)

War and an art exhibition(Kyoto formative arts University gallery Aube)

Art / nonart / nonart: Experiment in the public area in postwar Japan, 1950-1970(J.Paulgetty Museum, Los Angeles)

SEPTEMBER SHOW 2007(A Nishimura art gallery)

Imagery Play(PKM gallery Beijing)

MOT collection pop way 1960s - 2000s(Tokyo Museum of Contemporary Art)

Hyogo, person who has rendered distinguished services commendation.
Setagaya-ku, special culture service commendation.
2008 8 Solo exhibitions(Scai the bathhouse)

Solo exhibition(A Nishimura art gallery)

War and art. Fear and a vision of the beauty(Kyoto formative arts University gallery Aube)

An image of a human being exhibition of the 20th century.

A Tokushima prefectural Museum of Modern Art possession perfect gem exhibition(Gunma prefectural Tatebayashi art museum)

Japanese art: It is collected Hyogo from modern times to the present age(Oscar Niemmyer Museum)

The masked portrait(Marianne Boesky Gallery, N.Y.)

Asia and a European portrait exhibition(The National Museum of Art)

"Wonderland." A Japanese contemporary art exhibition(Opera gallery Hong-Kong)

An image to rebel against. The print media after the nonart and art. 1960 '-70'(Urawa Museum)

I publish novel "BURULAND" carried by literary arts magazine "Bungeishunju Ltd.".

Solo exhibition(Setagaya art museum)

Solo exhibition(Hyogo Tatsumi art building)

Solo exhibition(FRIEDMAN BENDA GALLERY)

Winning Kyoka Izumi literary

Found Here: http://www.tadanoriyokoo.com/prof/index.html

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Alphonse Maria Mucha (1860-1939)

Alphonse Maria Mucha,[1] first name from the Czech Alfons[2] (24 July 1860 – 14 July 1939), was a Czech Art Nouveau painter and decorative artist,[3] best known for his distinct style and his images of women. He produced many paintings, illustrations, advertisements, and designs.

Early years

Alphonse Maria Mucha was born in the town of Ivančice, Moravia (today's region of the Czech Republic). Although his singing abilities allowed him to continue his education through high school in the Moravian capital of Brünn (today Brno), drawing had been his first love since childhood. He worked at decorative painting jobs in Moravia, mostly painting theatrical scenery. In 1879 he moved to Vienna to work for a leading Viennese theatrical design company, while informally furthering his artistic education. When a fire destroyed his employer's business in 1881 he returned to Moravia, to do freelance decorative and portrait painting. Count Karl KhuenMikulov hired Mucha to decorate Hrušovany Emmahof Castle with murals, and was impressed enough that he agreed to sponsor Mucha's formal training at the Munich Academy of Fine Arts. of

Mucha moved to Paris in 1887, and continued his studies at Académie Julian and Académie Colarossi. In addition to his studies, he worked at producing magazine and advertising illustrations. Around Christmas 1894, Mucha happened to drop into a print shop where there was a sudden and unexpected need for a new advertising poster for a play starring Sarah Bernhardt, the most famous actress in Paris, at the Théâtre de la Renaissance on the Boulevard Saint-Martin. Mucha volunteered to produce a lithographed poster within two weeks, and on 1 January 1895, the advertisement for the play Gismonda by Victorien Sardou appeared on the streets of the city. It was an overnight sensation and announced the new artistic style and its creator to the citizens of Paris.[4] Bernhardt was so satisfied with the success of this first poster that she entered into a 6 year contract with Mucha.

Mucha produced a flurry of paintings, posters, advertisements, and book illustrations, as well as designs for jewellery, carpets, wallpaper, and theatre sets in what was initially called the Mucha Style but became known as Art Nouveau (French for 'new art'). Mucha's works frequently featured beautiful, strong young women in flowing vaguely Neoclassical looking robes, often surrounded by lush flowers which sometimes formed haloes behind the women's heads. In contrast with contemporary poster makers he used pale pastel colors.[5] The 1900 Universal Exhibition in Paris spread the "Mucha style" internationally, of which Mucha said "I think [the Exposition Universelle] made some contribution toward bringing aesthetic values into arts and crafts."[6] He decorated the Bosnia and Herzegovina Pavilion and collaborated in the Austrian Pavilion. His Art Nouveau style was often imitated. The Art Nouveau style however, was one that Mucha attempted to distance himself from throughout his life; he always insisted that rather than adhering to any fashionable stylistic form, his paintings came purely from within and Czech art.[4] He declared that art existed only to communicate a spiritual message, and nothing more; hence his frustration at the fame he gained through commercial art, when he most wanted to concentrate on more lofty projects that would ennoble art and his birthplace.

Marriage

Mucha married Maruška (Marie/Maria) Chytilová on June 10, 1906, in Prague. The couple visited the U.S. from 1906 to 1910, during which time their daughter, Jaroslava, was born in New York City. They also had a son, Jiri, (born March 12, 1915 in Prague; died April 5, 1991 in Prague) who later became a well known journalist, writer, screenwriter, author of autobiographical novels and studies of the works of his father. In the U.S. Alphonse expected to earn money to fund his nationalistic projects to demonstrate to Czechs that he had not "sold out".[4] He was supported by millionaire Charles R. Crane, who used his fortune to help promote revolutions and, after meeting Thomas Masaryk, Slavic nationalism. Alphonse and his family returned to the Czech lands and settled in Prague, where he decorated the Theater of Fine Arts, contributed his time and talent to create the murals in the Mayor's Office at the Municipal House, and other landmarks around the city. When Czechoslovakia won its independence after World War I, Mucha designed the new postage stamps, banknotes, and other government documents for the new state.

Le Pater

Mucha considered Le Pater his printed masterpiece, and referred to it in the January 5, 1900 issue of The Sun Newspaper (New York) as the thing he had "put [his] soul into". Printed on December 20, 1899, Le Pater was Mucha's occult examination of the themes of The Lord's Prayer and only 510 copies were produced.


Mucha spent many years working on what he considered his life's fine art masterpiece, The Slav Epic (Slovanská epopej), a series of twenty huge paintings depicting the history of the Czech and the Slavic people in general, bestowed to the city of Prague in 1928. He had dreamt of completing a series such as this, a celebration of Slavic history, since he was young. Since 1963 the series has been on display in the chateau in Moravský Krumlov the South Moravian RegionCzech Republic. in the

Death

The rising tide of fascism in the late 1930s led to Mucha's works, as well as his Slavic nationalism, being denounced in the press as 'reactionary'. When German troops marched into Czechoslovakia in the spring of 1939, Mucha was among the first persons to be arrested by the Gestapo. During the course of his interrogation, the aging artist fell ill with pneumonia. Though eventually released, he never recovered from the strain of this event, or from seeing his homeland invaded and overcome. He died in Prague on July 14, 1939, of a lung infection, and was interred there in the Vyšehrad cemetery.[3]


At the time of his death, Mucha's style was considered outdated. His son, author Jiří Mucha, devoted much of his life to writing about him and bringing attention to his art. In his own country, the new authorities were not interested in Mucha. His Slav Epic was rolled and stored for twenty-five years before being shown in Moravsky Krumlov and only recently has a Mucha museum appeared in Prague, run by his grandson, John Mucha.[4]

Mucha's work has continued to experience periodic revivals of interest for illustrators and artists. Interest in Mucha's distinctive style experienced a strong revival in the 1960s (with a general interest in Art Nouveau)[8] and is particularly evident in the psychedelic posters of Hapshash and the Coloured Coat, the collective name for two British artists, Michael English and Nigel Waymouth, who designed posters for groups such as Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.

It is a strongly acknowledged influence for Stuckist painter Paul Harvey whose subjects have included Madonna and whose work was used to promote The Stuckists Punk Victorian show at the Walker Art Gallery during the 2004 Liverpool Biennial.[7]

The Japanese manga artist Naoko Takeuchi released a series of official posters depicting five of the main characters from her manga series Sailor Moon mimicking Mucha's style. Another manga artist, the 1962 born Masakazu Katsura has also mimicked Mucha's style several times. Comic book artist and current Marvel Comics Editor in Chief Joe Quesada also borrowed heavily from Mucha's techniques for a series of covers, posters, and prints.

Fantasy artist Quinton Hoover also uses a style reminiscent of Mucha's art nouveau. Grindcoresludge metal band Soilent Green used a picture by Mucha for the cover of their album Sewn Mouth Secrets.[9] and

One of Mucha's paintings, Quo Vadis or alternately Petronius and Eunice, was the subject of a legal dispute in 1986. The judgment handed down by Richard Posner describes parts of Mucha's life and work biographically.[10]

Among his many other accomplishments, Mucha was also the restorer of Czech Freemasonry.[11]

On July 24th, 2010, he was honored with a Google Doodle in memory of his 150th birthday.[12]

Found Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphonse_Mucha

Alfons Mucha was a very influential but seldom mentioned figure in the history of art. He is more than anyone else responsible for the "art nouveau" style that developed around the turn of the century and applied his considerable talents to a wide variety of pursuits ranging from painting and sculpture to poster, magazine, and calendar illustration, and product and architectural design. It is probably as much because he did things other than paintings to be hung in museums that many of the leading artistic institutions have ignored his work for most of this century, but the fact that he opposed the cubist revolution and made recognizable and beautiful images meant that the critics of the 20th century would ignore his work. Those are the very things of course that make him worthy to appear here.

Found Here: http://www.goodart.org/artofam.htm