
Dep Art Gallery opens its new venue with an exhibition dedicated to Turi Simeti. After about ten years of activity, Dep Art opens a new exhibition centre for Italian and International Contemporary Art in the heart of Milan, with an exhibition dedicated to Turi Simeti, presenting around twenty white, shaped canvases, made between the beginning of the sixties and 2015.
The exhibition is curated by Federico Sardella, and it represents a homage to one of the most relevant artists of the international artistic panorama, who has been active for over 50 years and stood out for his capacity of undertaking an original and coherent research centred around shapes and equilibrium.
Since his debut Turi Simeti confronted himself and dialogued with the international artistic environment. To a purely bi-dimensional research the artist replied with an evolution of the concept of painting, making it three-dimensional through the application of relief elements on the canvas, at the beginning, and then through the extroflection of it, which marked the first step towards a sort of painting-object in a ideal dialogue between the pressures from the internal structure and the extroverted shapes. Within the context of a rigorous reductionist aspiration, his language shortly acquired a well-defined recognisability, thanks to the use of monochrome and relief as the only compositional devices. The emblematic shape and iconic characteristic of his research is the ellipse, which is the basic principle of the structure of his art that accompanied him during his whole career.
This show presents exclusively white canvases of different dimensions and from different periods, with a particular focus on his most recent works.
The exhibition will be accompanied by an Italian-English monograph of around 120 pages with a review by Federico Sardella, a reproduction of all works on show and an unpublished apparatus created on purpose by the curator of the show, with the cooperation of Turi Simeti Archive.
This exhibition marks the transition of Dep Art Gallery, established in 2006 by Antonio Addamiano, to the new venue located in via Comelico-Milano-in a 260 mq space distributed on two levels and structured to meet the needs of the important artists represented by Dep Art. The Gallery thus progresses in its growth: year after year it established relationships with important local and international public institutions, involved prominent cultural personalities and promoted the archiving of the artworks by Turi Simeti, whose Catalogue Raisonne of the works on canvas will be published before the end of 2016.
Along with artists like Lucio Fontana, Enrico Castellani, Piero Manzoni and Agostino Bonalumi, Turi Simeti played an active role in the Zero art movement of 1960s and 1970s. Still actively creating today, Simeti is considered a true pioneer, a ‘maestro,’ of 20th and 21st Century Italian art. Minimalist in conception, for the last 50 years, Simeti’s work has comprised of dynamic patterns of ovals that dance across the monochromatic surfaces of shaped canvases. This focused combination of color and shape speaks to Simeti’s concern with emphasizing the physical presence of the artwork itself, rather than an expression of the artist’s voice. Just as Fontana helped found Spazialismo with his punctured canvases, for decades Simeti has broken through key tenants of minimalism to explore the play of light on shapes created on monochromatic and tactile canvas surfaces. Simeti’s works exist not as single entities but as an active experience of color and shape, and ultimately a capturing of the dynamism that exists between these two aesthetic elements.
Opening in Milan in 2006 with Mario Nigro’s solo exhibition Opere di Mario Nigro, Dep Art Gallery presents compelling artworks by modern and contemporary Italian and international artists. The gallery moved into its current location in Via Comelico, a former school with substantial exhibition spaces, in 2015. Dedicated to presenting contemporary Italian art, Dep Art Gallery has also been the Turi Simeti archive centre—archiving the artist’s legacy and producing a catalogue raisonne of artworks on canvas—since 2013.

A respected voice in contemporary art discourse.
Focusing on ambitious storytelling and insightful art-world commentary. Ocula Magazine publishes in-depth interviews, critical essays and timely analysis on the artists, exhibitions and ideas driving the global art world.
Learn more about Ocula Magazine
Showcasing the best of the art world.
Ocula partners with galleries from around the world to highlight their artists, artworks and exhibitions. Gallery membership is by application and invitation, with each member vetted by an independent panel.
Learn more about Ocula Membership
Specialises in the sale of major artworks.
Led by a team with deep ties to the world’s leading auction houses, galleries and collectors. Ocula’s advisory team offers bespoke services to high-net-worth clients from around the world who are looking to acquire the best of contemporary and modern art.
Learn more about our team and services