Thaddaeus Ropac Announces Gallery Expansion to Milan

Located a short stroll from the iconic Duomo di Milano, the new premise—which will be the Austrian gallery's seventh—is set to open this autumn.

Thaddaeus Ropac, who represents globally recognised blue-chip artists like Antony Gormley, Anselm Kiefer, and Joan Snyder, announced plans to expand to Milan on Thursday.

Situated inside the neoclassical Palazzo Belgioioso, the new gallery will include 280 square metres of exhibition space, as well as an outdoor area for sculptures and installations.

'Milan is a cultural hub in Europe and plays a central role in the history and development of modern and contemporary art,' explained Ropac, who already has roots in London, Paris, Salzburg, and Seoul. 'Our new location will enable us to further expand the important relationships we have built up over decades with collectors and institutions in Italy and to present our artists in this dynamic environment,' he added.

Elena Bonanno di Linguaglossa, former senior director at Lévy Gorvy Dayan, will head the Milan operation as its executive director.

Bonanno di Linguaglossa told Financial Times that the infrastructure for Milan to become 'the art capital of the future' has long been in motion. 'Italy's wealth, its hard-working, big industrial families and their [art] collections, have been the engine of Milan for a long time,' she said.

For close to 30 years, Italy's largest art fair, Miart, has helped turn Milan into a destination for the wealthy every April. Recently, the country's increasingly attractive tax regime has brought the city into further focus as a permanent destination among these individuals—particularly from the U.K., where non-domiciled residents will be subject to stricter taxation rules on overseas income come April 2025.

While the Italian government doubled its annual flat tax on overseas income to 200,000 EUR last year, the country remains appealing to high-net-worth individuals for its relatively low inheritance tax rate of 4 to 8 percent. In comparison, the U.K. stands at 40 percent for estates valued above 400,000 USD (325,000 GBP).

Meanwhile, Italy's plans to slash VAT on art imports from outside the European Union from 10 to 5.5 percent is still under discussion.

Ropac is not alone in bringing contemporary art to Milan's maze of narrow streets. Italian dealer Massimo De Carlo inaugurated his first gallery in the city in 1987 with a show of Olivier Mosset. His early discovery of Maurizio Cattelan and many other Italian artists was fundamental in their introduction to international audiences.

However, since De Carlo, few other galleries of similar calibre have dipped their toes in the Italian city. Last April, Lehmann Maupin opened a pop-up space to coincide with the Venice Biennale and Miart, while Ben Brown Fine Arts has voiced plans to open a Milan gallery this year, adding to his spaces in Hong Kong and London.

Thaddaeus Ropac has yet to announce the inaugural programming for its autumn opening. —[O]