Biography

  Denis Masi
1942 – present

Denis Masi is an experimental artist who has worked, for 40 plus years, across a broad range of different media including: assemblage, sculpture, installation, film, video, performance, photography, print, drawing and painting. His primary interests are concerned with exploring the nature of power and especially power structures in society – that deeply embedded human desire to have and exert power or control in whatever measure. In his work he has focused on the many forms of power but especially psychological, territorial, media and social power

As Marco Livingstone wrote in his introduction for the catalogue of Masi’s extensive 1996 survey exhibition at Culturgest in Lisbon:

‘Since the 1970s Denis Masi has devoted his art to an investigation of the many ways in which power, particularly institutionalised authority, manifests itself as a dehumanising, negative force that controls our lives and circumscribes our imagined freedoms. It is this preoccupation, rather than any purely aesthetic aim, that gives coherence to an artistic production that has encompassed a wide range from large-scale sculptural installations to charcoal drawings, etchings, metal reliefs and framed computer-generated photographs. Masi's own perspective on his development divides his art into four phases, beginning with a psychological investigation of the exercise of power on a subliminal level, moving on to a commemorative art involved with rites and rituals, then on to the manifestation of dominance in territorial terms and most recently to an analysis of the ways in which our thoughts are influenced by the processing and presentation of information by the media.’

From 2000 Masi has been exhibiting large-scale photographic works, as he has been particularly interested in social power as experienced at special public events and festivals, those occasions when people gather together to share an experience, a kind of glue or social capital, and how this encounter can be manifest through the photographic portrait.

Born in 1942. He studied at Seton Hall University, N.J. USA; Brera Academy of Fine Art, Milan, Italy; PG Studies at Slade School of Fine Art and Chelsea School of Art, London, UK.

He has had numerous one-person exhibitions since 1965, in private and public galleries.

He was the first artist in residence at the Imperial War Museum (1984); Sargant Fellow at The British School at Rome (2003); and has held residences in Morocco, Bulgaria and Iceland. His work is held in major private and public collections nationally and internationally and he has completed public and corporate commissions as well as designs for the theatre. He has been an academic from 1968 until 2009.

He lives and works in Spitalfields, London.

  Curriculum vitae
1942

Born West Virginia, U.S.A.

1960-64

Seton Hall University, New Jersey, U.S.A

1964-66

Brera Academy of Fine Art, Milan, Italy

1966-67

Lived and worked in Paris, France

1966

17eme Salon de la Jeune Peinture, Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France

1967

Prix Arnys, Paris, France

1967-68

Slade School of Fine Art, University College, London, UK

1973

8e Biennial de Paris, British Film Section, Paris, France

1981-82

Chelsea School of Art, London, UK

1982

XI Premio Lubiam, Sabbioneta, Italy

1984

First Artist-in-Residence, Imperial War Museum, London
Theatre Designs for Rational Theatre / Hidden Grin Theatre Company, Sets and Costumes

1994

Artist-in-Residence, 17th Festival Culturel d'Asilah, Morocco
Guest Lecture, Annual Exhibition of Contemporary Art, Soros Center for the Arts, Sofia, Bulgaria

1996

22nd International Biennial of Graphic Art, British Print Selection, Ljubljana, Slovenia

2003

Sargant Fellow, British School at Rome, Rome, Italy

2005-09

Faculty Member, British School at Rome at The British Academy, London

2007

Artist-in-Residence, Hafnarborg Institute of Culture and Fine Art, Iceland

1964-66

Living and art practice in Milan, Italy

1966-67

Living and art practice in Paris, France

1967 – present

Living and art practice in London, UK

  Teaching
1968-71

Bradford Regional College of Art

1970-96

Croydon College, School of Art and Design

1988 – 2000

Wimbledon School of Art, University of Surrey

1996 – 2009

Slade School of Fine Art, University College, London

1970 – present

Guest lecturing in many colleges and universities throughout the UK

  External examiner / moderator
1995-99

University of East London, School of Art and Design – BA (Hons) Degree

2000-05

University of the Arts London, Central St Martins College of Art, Byam Shaw
– BA (Hons) Degree

2004-06

The Glasgow School of Art – QAA Moderator

2006-09

Goldsmiths College, University of London – MFA Degree

  One-person shows
1965

Castello di Angera, Angera, Italy

1966

Il Cenobbio Galleria, Milan

1969

Camden Arts Centre, London

1972

Galleria Diagramma, Milan
New Lane Gallery, Bradford

1976

Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol
Angela Flowers Gallery, London

1979

ICA Main Gallery, London

1980

Spectro Arts Workshop, Gallery 1, Newcastle upon Tyne

1981

Angela Flowers Gallery, London
Spacex Gallery, Exeter

1982

Lewis Johnstone Gallery, London
Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool

1983

South Hill Park Arts Centre, Bracknell, Berks

1984

ICA Upper Galleries, London

1987

Third Eye Centre, Glasgow
Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston
Foyle Arts Project, Derry, N.I.

1988

Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead
Imperial War Museum, London
Serpentine Gallery, London
Southampton Art Gallery, Southampton

1991

Edward Totah Gallery, London
Anderson O’Day Gallery, London
Cornerhouse, Galleries 1 & 2, Manchester

1993

Angel Row Gallery, Nottingham

1994

Anderson O’Day Gallery, London

1995

KunstlerHaus, Bremen, Germany

1996

Culturgest Gallery and Museum, Lisbon, Portugal

2001

Museum of Santa Maria della Scala, Siena, Italy

2002

Photo Works Gallery Le Temps de Pose, Cotignac, Var, France

2003

Barbican Art Gallery, Art Space, London

2004

The Gallery, GlaxcoSmithKline, Headquarters Building, London
Cover Up, London

2006

The Drawing Gallery, London

2007

Hafnarborg Institute of Culture and Fine Art, Iceland

2008

Fondazione Europea del Disegno, Meina, Italy

  Group Shows
2017

Raven Row, London, This Way Out of England: Gallery House in Retrospect