Paolo Scheggi was born in Settignano, Florence, in 1940. After studying in London, he moved to Milan in 1961 where he met contemporary artists and aroused the interest of Lucio Fontana, who from 1962 followed his career attentively. Between the late 1950s and early 1960s, Scheggi transitioned rapidly from works of assembled metal sheets and collaged materials to his so-called Intersuperfici, monochrome works characterized by three overlapping canvases with elliptical or circular openings. In 1964 Scheggi was invited to participate in the 44 protagonisti della visualità strutturata exhibition curated by Carlo Belloli at the Galleria Lorenzelli in Milan. A year later, Gillo Dorfles selected him as one of the exponents of Pittura Oggetto, and Umbro Apollonio and Germano Celant became interested in his work. In 1965 Scheggi joined the Nove Tendencjie movement, and was in contact with the Nul and Zero groups.

By the mid-1960s Scheggi was internationally renowned. 1966 he was invited to exhibit in the 33rd Venice Biennale and in the Weiss auf Weiss exhibition curated by Harald Szeemann at the Bern Kunsthalle. In 1967 he exhibited in the 5th Biennale des Jeunes Artistes in Paris, at Lo spazio dell’Immagine exhibition at Palazzo Trinci in Foligno, and the Exposition International des Beaux Arts de Montreal. The following year his work was included in the Public Eye exhibition in Hamburg, and at the Teatro delle mostre exhibition at the Galleria La Tartaruga in Rome. Despite the brevity of his career, Scheggi experimented with a variety of visual languages, and as early as 1964 his research extended to the field of architecture. He worked as model builder for the Nizzoli Associati architecture and design studio and designed a new Milanese fashion house for Germana Marucelli. After these early “gratifying [vivibili] experiences of plastic integration in architecture” he designed and constructed the Intercamera plastica, first displayed in the Galleria del Naviglio, Milan, in January 1967.

In 1968 Scheggi broadened his research to include theatre, transcending the traditional space of the gallery and expanding into the city. Examples of this are the Marcia Funebre o della geometria for the Campo Urbano event in Como, and the performance Oplà Stick that traveled from Milan and Zagreb to Florence in 1969. In 1970–71, he adopted a mythical-political perspective, studying religious, anthropological, and symbolic forms of art, and participated in exhibitions such as Amore mio and Vitalità del negativo, both of which took place in 1970. Scheggi died in Rome in 1971. Tomba della geometria and 6profetiper6geometrie were exhibited in 1972 at the 36th Venice Biennale.