☛ Mucha Foundation: “The Seasons: Autumn” (poster), colour lithograph, 103 x 54 cm, 1896. © Mucha Foundation.

Large format reproduction shown above retrieved from Rebecca Noble. Reproductions free of copyrights can be found over at Europeana and Wikimedia Commons. For more details about how copyrights apply to photographic reproduction of Alphonse Mucha’s artwork, see an update I made here.

This panel is part of a set of four from the Seasons series created in 1896:

From the Mucha Foundation:

This was Mucha’s first set of decorative panels and it became one of his most popular series. It was so popular that Mucha was asked by Champenois to produce at least two more sets based on the same theme in 1897 and 1900. Designs for a further two sets also exist.

The idea of personifying the seasons was nothing new – examples could be found in the works of the Old Masters’ as well as in Champenois’s other publications. However, Mucha’s nymph-like women set against the seasonal views of the countryside breathed new life into the classic theme. In the four panels shown here, Mucha captures the moods of the seasons – innocent Spring, sultry Summer, fruitful Autumn and frosty Winter, and together they represent the harmonious cycle of Nature. (Mucha Foundation: “The Seasons (series)”)

Europeana has 91 images by Alphonse Mucha, all of which seem to be in the Public Domain (not copyrighted).

Previously: “Job” (poster) by Alphonse Mucha, 1898.