With its solo show of works by Gianfranco Zappettini, which opens on 28 May at 7pm, the MAAB Gallery, Milan, will be presenting a selection of works that foreshadow his analytical period, of which the artist was to be a protagonist in both Italy and abroad halfway through the 1960s.

Until 10 July, in the Via Nerino venue, you will be able to see various works created between 1966 and 1971 which demonstrate the close attention given by Zappettini to the interior structure of his works, to his own definition of geometry, and to the limits of optical perception.

In this rare selection of works, this Italian master reveals the influence exerted on him by the German architect Konrad Wachsmann and the developments of his youthful experiences in the studios of Max Bill and Sonia Delaunay. Already in these pieces the aesthetic aspect of his paintings is not the end result, but a solution arrived at by a process in which the elements underpinning the surface are analyzed. This evolution was to lead Zappettini to the threshold of human perceptive possibilities, something that was to be part of his change of direction in 1973 when he began to concentrate on the elements of painterly language, and when he demonstrated that he was among the most rigorous exponents of Analytical Painting.

The exhibition is backed by a 346-page book in Italian, English and German, with essays by Marco Meneguzzo and Alberto Zanchetta, a book that is, above all, an impressive testimony to the artist's career. It contains reproductions of catalogues, magazines, and documents of the period.

Gianfranco Zappettini was born in Genoa in 1939. In 1962 he held his first personal exhibition in Palazzetto Rosso in Genoa and he began working in the offices of Konrad Wachsmann and, together with the German painter Winfred Gaul, he experienced the artistic environment in Germany and Holland. In 1971 he was invited to the “Arte Concreta” (Concrete Art) exhibition at the Westfälischer Kunstverein in Münster, curated by Klaus Honnef. He participated in the main exhibitions of the Painting of those years: “Tempi di percezione” (Times of perception, Livorno, 1973), “Un future possible. Nuova Pittura” (A Possible Future – New Painting, Ferrara, 1973), “Geplante Malerei” (Münster and Milan, 1974), “Analytische Malerei” (Düsseldorf, 1975), “Concerning Painting...” (a travelling exhibition in different Dutch Museums, 1975-1976). In 1977 he was invited to the Documenta 6 in Kassel and in 1978 he attended the “Abstraction Analytique” at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris. Recently his work has focused on the symbolism of the warp and woof. In 2007, the VAF-Stiftung Foundation dedicated to him an impressive monograph curated by Volker Feierabend and Marco Meneguzzo.

Among the latest collective exhibitions must be mentioned “Pittura analitica. I percorsi italiani. 1970-1980”, Museo della Permanente (Milan, 2007), “Pittura aniconica”, Casa del Mantegna (Mantonva, 2008), “Analytica”, Annotazioni d’Arte (Milan, 2008), “Pensare pittura” (Thinking Painting, Museum of Modern Art at Villa Croce, Genoa, 2009), “Analytische Malerei”, Forum Kunst (Rottweil, 2011). Among the personal exhibitions over the last fifty years dedicated to him from both public and private spaces, must be mentioned: Westfälischer Kunstverein (Münster, 1975), Internationaal Cultureel Centrum (Antwerp, 1978), Museum of Contemporary Art at Villa Croce (Genoa, 1997), CAMeC-The Centre of Modern and Contemporary Art (La Spezia, 2007), Forum Kunst (Rottweil, 2007, with Paolo Icaro), Lucca Center of Contemporary Art (Lucca, 2012).