Deus ex machina

Luboš Plný whose international recognition was confirmed by his selection in the 57th Venice Biennale titled Viva Arte Viva (curated by Christine Macel) in 2017. As the first outsider artist acquired by the MNAM in 2013, he has enjoyed numerous institutional exhibitions in recent years. These include exhibitions at contemporary art museums in Kobe and Hiroshima, Japan, at the Rencontres de la Photographie in Arles, at the Kunsthalle in Dresden, and in his hometown of Prague. In 2017, the Dox Art Center dedicated a solo exhibition to him, and in 2022, the Rudolfinum facilitated a dialogue between him and artists such as Louise Bourgeois and William Kentridge. In September 2023, we dedicated a solo show to him in our two spaces, a monography and a performance at the Beaux-Arts de Paris.

Deeply impacted by his discovery of Augustin Lesage, Éric Benetto explores the most arduous spiritual paths: monastic life and ascetic practices of the Orthodox hesychasm. His Chinese ink or pencil drawings, on paper, radiographs and other MRI scans are imbued with syncretic mysticism as well as an exceptional modernity. Before his first solo exhibition organized by the gallery in 2019, his work had already been noticed at the exhibition Brut Now: art brut in the time of technologies, at the Belfort museums. Since then, he has joined prestigious collections such as those of Laurent Dumas (France) or Treger-Saint Silvestre (Portugal).