The Meeting at Krizky

The Meeting at Krizky is the ninth part of Mucha's Slav Epic, by which point he was almost half way in finishing a series of work which would become the highlight of his career. It was highly significant both artistically, but also historically in visually recording the key moments in the development of the Slavic race.

Here we find an interesting composition in which almost all of the significant detail is spread across the bottom third of the canvas. The upper half is filled with a menacing looking sky which immediately sets the scene with a dark atmosphere. Several trees and flag poles reach up towards the top of the canvas, but aside from that it is fairly devoid of activity. Below, however, we immediately see a whole flurry of figures seemingly carrying out a variety of tasks as a set of ferocious waves batter the shoreline. Mucha carefully sizes these people in order to create a strong feeling of perspective, with the smaller figures depicting a distant location within the centre of the artwork. In the foreground we find seven or eight people in much stronger detail, with their clothing visible and their activities clearer.

The content found in this painting refers to a previous installment in the series, known as Master Jan Hus Preaching at the Bethlehem Chapel, which refers to someone who was brutally murdered after challenging the Catholic Church. This led to many following their religion in their local language, Czech in a move which has some similarity to how Hans Holbein would produce several portraits of Henry VIII who decided on pushing England away from the influence of the same church. What we see within The Meeting at Krizky is the gathering of collaborators, hoping to produce a groundswell of support, potentially leading to a full revolt. They would meet up in remote areas such as this in order to avoid the gaze of the Catholic Church.

Alphonse Mucha would become the most famous Czech artist of all time and his Slav Epic series would also help to teach the world about the important moments in the history of his people, just as it was intended. This particular piece was finished in 1916, several years after he had actually started the project, and even longer from when he first came up with the initial idea. This is one of the few paintings from the series which is in the portrait format, where its length is greater than its width. This allows the artist to spread the vertical space with several trees and flag poles, which leads to some parts of the composition being relatively bare, whilst others are particularly busy. All of the detail was produced using egg tempera, which is a relatively traditional technique perfected during the Italian Renaissance and generally replaced by the use of oils in the years that followed.