Alphonse Mucha

Alphonse Mucha gave Art Nouveau its best-known face: a young woman framed by flowers, swirling hair and a halo of ornament, drawn with a clean outline and filled with soft, pale colour. His decorative panels, such as The Seasons of 1896, turned the idea of the poster into something people wanted on their walls.

Born in Ivančice in Moravia, he trained in Munich and then at the Académie Julian and Académie Colarossi in Paris. His break came with theatre posters for Sarah Bernhardt in the 1890s, and commercial work followed for everything from biscuits to soap. After 1910 he returned to Prague and spent years on The Slav Epic, twenty huge canvases on Slavic history.

His work can be seen at the Mucha Museum and the National Gallery in Prague. In the paintings, look at how the flat patterned borders frame a gently modelled face.