Girl with Loose Hair and Tulips

This painting dates from 1920 and can now be found in the collection of the Mucha Museum in Prague, Czech Republic. Mucha himself remains the most famous Czech artist of all time, though this region has contributed some other major names from across the ages.

Here we find in front of us a simple portrait of a girl within a domestic setting. Mucha would produce many similar works to this during his career, with a number of them actually being of his own family members. He seemed to enjoy focusing on the personal lives of individuals, capturing the environment in which they lived rather than focusing on the more traditional formal portraiture, where postures and background elements are carefully crafted in an unnatural manner. The girl herself is wearing fairly relaxed nightwear which hangs loosely from her shoulders. Her hair is loose and untidy, as if she has just awoken. She stares off into the distance to our left, and the remaining features of her bedroom are delivered in a subtle, light series of tones. We can, perhaps, make out a view of a garden in the far background, though detail is deliberately kept to a vague level in order to avoid distracting us from the main figure.

Mucha was a talented artist who could work in a variety of different ways. He was devoted to the female form within his career, but found many different ways of incorporating its beauty into his oeuvre. For example, compare Girl with Loose Hair and Tulips to sections of his Slav Epic, for example, or with the flat illustrative style of classic paintings such as Gismonda and Zodiac. He would go far beyond oil painting within his career, making use of tempera, watercolours and also drawing designs for menus and stained glass windows. He adored his role within the Art Nouveau movement and was considered amongst its brightest lights. Even today his reputation is strong and most regular art followers will be well aware of his achievements, with any of his original paintings now commanding huge valuations were they ever to come up for sale.

There have been a number of travelling exhibitions of the artist's work in recent years which have been put on by various institutions within the Czech Republic. These have helped to draw attention to his work in Western Europe for those who have been unable to travel over to the museum set up in his name. This is an important method of helping to preserve his legacy around the continent, and also to ensure that his full breadth of work is entirely understood, rather than simply one aspect or another. The media have tended to draw attention to his flat illustrative work, but there is so much else to see here, including some delightful portraits of his family members which are are also dotted around this website. Additionally, his drawings are also diverse and highly accomplished and the skills required to produce those sit behind much of his work with other mediums as well.