Job

Alphonse Mucha

1896

Color lithograph

Minneapolis Institute of Art

A woman with long blonde hair is shown in profile, smoking a cigarette. She is adorned with red berries in her hair and surrounded by decorative elements. Proponents of the Art Nouveau movement of the late 1800s sought escape from the limitations of past traditions, and they achieved it by creating a new style. By applying this style to all forms of creativity, they hoped to eliminate the separation between art and craft. Alphonse Mucha did just that by treating the poster, humbly temporary and commercial, like a canvas. The Job cigarette paper being advertised also represents literal escape. Despite Mucha's use of an idealized female in this poster, respectable women of the nineteenth century did not smoke. This pleasure belonged to men, who could use it as an excuse to retreat into