Drawn at Home:

Drawn at Home by Adéle du Plessis - Photograph of Adéle working on one of her paintings in her garden.

Photo - Nicole Sciarone

Drawn at Home 

Drawn at Home is an exhibition of paintings made by contemporary South African artist Adéle du Plessis. During March and April 2020, Adéle sketched and walked every day with her daughter artist Nicole Sciarone in Delft. From this drawing exercise, Adéle painted a series of paintings. She plays with Plato's philosophy about art and Mimesis. Plato didn't like art. He argued that it does not belong to an intellectual society. Art was too far removed from reality to be of any value. Adéle has played with her sketches and Plato's ideas about art in her paintings.

Plato and art in an ideal society

Plato reasoned in Politeia that an idea of ​​something like a chair was the ideal and perfect chair. When you start thinking about what it should look like it is already a degree away from the perfect chair. The implementation and making of the actual chair is then a second rate product because it would never be as perfect as the thoughts of an ideal chair. And if an artist were to paint a chair, it is three degrees away from the perfect chair (which, by the way, had no shape, until you have to think of it in your head). Therefore, artists should be banned from an ideal society. In Lockdown, during the COVID-19 pandemic, art is exactly what saved us. Music, movies, series, crafting and watching the artist how to enrich your life.

Importance of art during COVID-19

Since Plato argued this centuries ago, his students and hundreds of people have continued to contradict it until today. Precisely, because art is still often considered superflous. Plato is only the starting point of the argument for the arts in our lives. Plato is a bit part of art philosophy 101. And most people have already encountered him somewhere. Adéle mentioned his philosophy when telling about her artwork. She was also not quite sure what it meant down to the last detail. Writing this, I had also forgotten that Plato used this as an argument to banish artists from society because there would be no room for them.

Art in Quarentaine

The current pandemic has made us aware of the importance of art to maintain a rich life. Adéle was not formally defending art. She was sketching a bit with her daughter. Then she started painting the sketches. She went after painting the sketches. She did not paint the plants and glass and water. She painted the sketches of it. She investigated the effect of a sketch. That's a degree further away from the idea that Plato as the head. She likes playing with definitive statements as Adéle in a word always been anti-establishment.

The Drawn at Home is a series of sketches of small objects in her house.

You will see cuttings, bowls, cuttings in glasses, pots, perfume and ceramic objects in the QUARANTINE DRAW SERIES series.

Buying paintings by Adéle du Plessis

Adéle du Plessis sold one painting in 1989 and then given her paintings away from 1991-2007. 2008-2019 Adéle had been exhibiting and working on commission. In 2019 her daughter Tascha Sciarone (Art Historian) started a gallery to represent female artists over 50 who have been underrepresented in the art world. Since 2019 Adéle has sold as more than 12 paintings to variety of collectors for their private or professional collection. 

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