Ettore Spalletti was born in Cappelle sul Tavo in 1940. His research began towards the end of the 1960s and concentrated on a monochromatic painting, inspired in part by the Gestalt theory, painting with which the pigment is applied on wooden panels, marble or metal that allow the light and color to be reconfigured through the work in the environment in which it is inserted. The pigment is spread evenly over the entire application surface and then manipulated by the artist in a light and repeated movement that mixes the pure color by putting it in direct relation with the light of the surrounding space.

Spalletti participates in important international exhibitions such as Documenta in Kassel in 1982 and 1992 and the Quadrennial in Rome; he won first prize for painting at the 1948 Venice Biennale, an event to which he was invited five times. Among the most important solo exhibitions are those at the MoMA (2000) and the Guggenheim (1993) in New York, at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris (1991), at the Henry Moore Foundation (2005) and at the National Gallery of ‘Modern Art of Rome (2010).

The most important retrospective on the artist entitled “A day so white, so white” was held in 2014 and simultaneously located in the GAM in Turin, the MAXXI in Rome and the MADRE in Naples. Ettore Spalletti passed away in 2019 in Spoltore.