I spent a weekend in Prague and I was so excited to see the original artworks of Alphonse Mucha. We studied his “JOB” advertising in school and were tested on it. His work is particularly feminine, he depicts the four seasons as fairies and has produced wonderful posters, some of them with Sarah Bernhard as his muse. Art Nouveau is heavily influenced by the shapes of nature, leaves and flowers in particular. Decorative, flowing and floral, it has found its way all the way through to architecture. However, Mucha’s posters as well as some Art Nouveau inspired fonts are the more popular remains of this period. Prague is one of Art Nouveau’s epicentres so I was super excited to go to the Mucha Museum in Prague, which is the only museum in the world dedicated to Mucha. I was not disappointed. Most of his posters are tall and slim, almost like pillars, which is a good excuse the get the whole poster series. Why only choose spring when you can get the other three seasons from the gift shop? No frame needed, the artworks are heavily adorned, they do the job of framing themselves. And if you fancy a more precious souvenir, there are many jewellery shops where you can buy original Art Nouveau pieces, for an adequate price.
Prague is a beautifully clean place, the buildings are old and grand, almost as if freshly painted. The city displays the charm of an old town however I do have to stress that I was very impressed by the size of it all. When I saw a girl having her breakfast on a balcony on the fourth floor, that fourth floor seemed extremely high up, which suggests to me that the ceilings must be generally much higher than in London. Everything seems wider and taller, similar to Berlin.
Graffitis are rare as I suppose they don’t conform to the charm of the city and it certainly seems as if it purposely kept in mint condition to attract tourists. However I managed to get a couple of snaps.
If you don’t care about art, worry not: Prague is popular for stag and hen dews. In two days we probably saw 10 of them. My dad used to say that Czech beer is the best, so yes, I guess it must be true.
