Sale 2435 - Alphonse Mucha & Masters of Art Nouveau, January 26, 2017

ALPHONSE MUCHA (1860-1939)

216

●

LOTERIE / NARODNI JEDNOTY PRO JIHOZÁPADNI MORAVU V BRNÉ. 1912.

x38

inches, 185

x98

cm. V. Neubert, Smichov, Prague.

Condition B+: restored loss in upper right corner; repaired tears and staining in margins; minor overpainting

in lower right corner; creases in margins and image. Three-sheets. Framed. Unexamined out of frame.

“This poster offers, at 1 koruna apiece, lottery tickets to benefit the National Union for Southwestern

Moravia at Brno, with the main prize of 25,000 korun . . . the organization was a regional branch of a

nationwide effort to establish schools that would teach Czech and Moravian children in their own

language. Such schools had to be supported by private funds, since all the schools provided by the state,

then still part of the Austrian Empire, used German only” (Lendl p. 278). Here, Mucha “used his favorite

motif of a dead tree as a seat for the symbolic mother of the nation, C˘ echia, who bends her head in a

gesture of despair and defeat. Her right hand rests on a primitive wooden statue of the three-faced pagan

god Svantovit, the protector of the early Slavs. His sun sign, horn, sacred steed and miraculous sword are

carved in a childish style on his chest. At the front of the composition, a school girl with books and pencils

looks at the viewer with an accusing expression as if to say ‘the ancient Slavic gods are of no help; it is the

living who must come to my rescue” (Spirit of Art Nouveau p. 179). The text banners at the top and the

bottom of the poster were printed on separate sheets of paper, so occasionally this image will appear

without any text. This is one of two posters Mucha designed advertising this lottery “as a patriot for whom

the preservation of the Czech language and culture was of enormous importance” (Spirit of Art Nouveau

p. 178).

RARE

. We have found only four copies at auction since 1986. Lendl p. 278, Rennert / Weill 100,

Mucha / Henderson 102, Mucha / Bridges A60, Triumph des Jugendstils 207 (var), Spirit of Art Nouveau

38 (var), Darmstadt P70, Grand Palais A70.

[6,000/9,000]