Czech painter Alfons Mucha (1860–1939) gained world fame thanks to his original Art Nouveau decorative work in Paris at the turn of the 19th and 20th century. He put his heart elsewhere though: in a cycle of twenty monumental paintings, inspired by Slavic mythology and the history of the Czech nation. Mucha worked on the Slav Epic for almost twenty years and first unveiled it to the public in the fall of 1928 to celebrate ten years of the independence of Czechoslovakia in the Great Hall of the just completed Veletržní Palace.
