Day 458: Skeleton Key

Prague – Kutna Hora – Prague, Czech Republic

I have heard of the “bone church in Czech Republic” for a while now. It’s located in a suburb town Kutna Hora, which is merely an hour or so away from Prague. Larry from CS had decided to join me on my day trip there.

The bone church’s proper name is Sedlec Ossuary. Within it, about 40,000 human skeletons reside, decorating the chapel. The bones were arranged in such ways forming chandelier, code of arm, and various architectural design.

Besides the ossuary, Kutna Hora as a town is pretty quiet and relaxing. There are two other famous churches, one of which is actually a UNESCO Heritage site.

Back in Prague late afternoon, I was a bit lazy to do more wandering but I wanted really badly to see Alfons Mucha’s “Slav Epic” series of paintings. Fighting myself to brave the cold and windy Prague, I was out again to Veletrzni Palac art center. It’s actually a no-brainer for me to make that decision since if I had been in Prague half a year ago, I wouldn’t have been able to see these paintings at all. They were relocated without approval from the Moravian town Moravsky Krumlov to Prague, causing a big controversy.

Slav Epic is a monumental series of 20 enormous paintings. The series are aptly titled. The paintings are indeed very Slavic and definitely epic. I found myself in awe not just in the sheer size of the paintings, but also in the amount of details and brush stroke works in them. There are always a lot going on in each painting, almost too much to soak in in one viewing. Most of the pieces also have a few characters who seemingly engage the viewers, staring at them either with a strong gaze or a hollow look in their eyes.