The new coalition of Prague is negotiating the future of the Slav Epic

Prague - The leadership of Prague is still unclear about where to place the Slav Epic by Alfons Mucha. A working group has been formed to discuss the solution, and the first results could be known by the end of the month. Hana Třeštíková (Praha Sobě), the councillor for culture, told the Czech Press Agency. The city has long been planning to build a special building for the series of paintings, which Mucha specified as a condition for the work to be transferred to the metropolis after his death. The previous leadership approved placing the paintings in the planned extension of the Lapidarium building at the Exhibition Grounds, for which a project and a building permit are already prepared.

"So far we don't have anything concrete; we are still working on it," Třeštíková stated. Regarding the project of the former leadership at the Exhibition Grounds, she said she needed to familiarize herself with it in detail before forming a definitive opinion. "It certainly has justification, but I also see some weaknesses in the project," she said.

Former councillor for culture and current chairman of the cultural committee Jan Wolf (KDU-ČSL/United Forces for Prague) will advocate within the coalition for the city to continue with the original plan. According to him, the Exhibition Grounds is on the path to becoming a representative complex again. He also reminded that the extension project is already prepared, including all permits. "I believe there is currently no better place," he said.

According to him, in the meantime, Prague could lend the paintings abroad again, as it did two years ago when they were exhibited in Japan. "The experience that 662,000 people saw the exhibition in Japan in less than 90 days is simply incredible," he stated. He added that in Brno, where the paintings were loaned from last May until the end of the year, 75,000 visitors came to see them. If a foreign interested party appears and the Ministry of Culture permits the loan, Wolf said he would support it.

Last year, nine out of the 20 canvases of the Epic were loaned in Brno, while another part is on display in the Municipal House from last July until January 13. After their return, the paintings will go back to the storage of the Gallery of the Capital City.

The Epic was long located at the castle in Moravský Krumlov, from where it was moved before the elections in 2010 to the Veletržní Palace in Prague, where it was exhibited for a while. In the past, construction of a new building in Letná or Těšnov was planned for the exhibition of the work, but neither was realized. Prague has been in a long-standing lawsuit with Mucha's relative John Mucha, who claims that the city never became the owner of the series because it did not fulfill the artist's condition to build separate exhibition spaces for the canvases.