Denis was born in Soviet Ryazan in 1973, into a family of engineers, in one of the typical "Khrushchyovka" apartment buildings. From an early age, he was interested in drawing and went on to attend an art school, and later the Ryazan Art College. After completing his studies in 1991, he began working as an artist designer, and in 1993, he moved to Moscow and enrolled at the Stroganov Moscow State University of Arts and Industry, on one of the most ambitious art faculties in the former Soviet Union, Graphic Design.
In Moscow, Denis began his career as a designer, and after creating the interior for the studio of 90s pop star Bogdan Titomir, who was at the height of his popularity at the time, he was recognised as a sought-after Moscow designer. The studio interior was designed in a completely new style at the time, called Techno-Grunge. From that moment on, Russian show business stars began approaching Denis for design work, and from the mid-90s, as part of the group of artists called "Three Captains" (Denis Kryuchkov, Stas Kirin, Mikhail Chernykh), he became a show director for top-tier Russian celebrities. He was the show director of the First Moscow Fashion Weeks, the "Todes" ballet show, concerts by Valery Leontiev, Nadezhda Babkina, Alexander Buynov, Igor Nikolaev, Natasha Koroleva, Alla Pugacheva, Vladimir Vinokur, Valentin Yudashkin, Alexander Peskov, Boris Moiseev, and many others. Currently, the "Three Captains" company is a contractor for the Kremlin Congress Palace and the stage director of parades on Red Square.
Parallel to his career as a show director, Denis was also developing his career as an interior designer. In 1999, his work on the "Cosmic" game center earned him the award for "Best Game Center of the Year in Russia." From 1994 to 2003, Denis completed more than 50 public interiors, restaurants, and clubs.
In 1998, together with a partner, he opened a company to produce outdoor advertising and design structures called "Apriori." It is now one of the largest Russian companies in the field of outdoor advertising.
In 2000, Denis became a member of the Moscow Union of Artists and participated in several of the union's exhibitions.
From the beginning of 2000, Denis worked less with the entertainment industry, which was resistant to absorbing fashionable global trends, causing stagnation, and he left the "Three Captains".
He decided to build his own show business and shifted his creative focus to underground culture, which was experiencing a boom. In Russia at that time, there was a boom in electronic music, and rap and hip-hop were emerging.
It took three years to find the right form, and in 2004, as a producer, art director, and co-owner, Denis created the creative association "Gazgolder," which aimed to unite different creative forces to create their own show business as an alternative to the stagnating post-Soviet entertainment industry. The association included artists, musicians, and businessmen.
In 2005, the club "Gazgolder", which was led by the creative association, became incredibly popular and won the award for "Best Club of the Year in Russia". The creative association became the center of urban attraction. Gazgolder signed its first artists, including Rostov rapper Basta and poet Oleg Grooz. Denis, who had been long experimenting with video, directed the first music videos for the underground performers of that time: Basta, Gruz, Noggano, Guf, Bogdan Titomir, and others. He designed the covers for all of the creative association's productions, and for the first albums of Basta.
In 2006, at Denis's initiative, the artists of the creative association got their own gallery space, GazGallery, where Denis acted as a curator in collaboration with Sergei Anufriev. The gallery featured the works of artists such as Alexander Svet (Kholodenko), Sergey Anufriev, Denis Kryuchkov, Hermes Zygott, Sergey Bugaev-Afrika, Yuri Balashov, Masha Lvova, and others.
The creative association was located on the territory of Arma, the old gas plant on the outskirts of Kursk railway station in Moscow. Denis created a 3D concept for the development of the plant's territory, based on which a modern reconstruction of the area was carried out. To start the process of reconstruction, an unprecedented loft-style renovation was carried out in one of the factory buildings in collaboration with Denis Simachev, and the first iconic tenants appeared: the brand "Simachev", office of the magazine "Menu of Pleasures", and the graphic design studio "Zoran Bureau". This was the first Moscow democratic Loft cluster, which launched a huge wave of loft-style reconstructions throughout the city and the country. Within a year, the plant's territory was filled with various creative offices. Now, the art cluster around Kursk railway station has already become a genuine urban quarter, and dreams have become a reality.
The successful operation of the fast food restaurant chain "Kruzhka", which Denis created in partnership in the early 2000s, allowed the creative association “Gazgolder” to exist during the launch period. The correctly created concept of the democratic Russian pub was quickly developed, and by 2006 the chain had nearly 15 restaurants (later on, the chain grown into 50 restaurants).
In 2005, as a director, Denis shot his first film "Ditches" based on the play by poet Oleg Gruz. It is a dialogue between an artist and a poet, the two patients in a mental hospital, who talk in verse without leaving their ward.
In 2006, Den directed a mockumentary film called "Tea Drunk" with Basta in the lead role, in collaboration with him as a director. The film was conceived as a comedic addiction therapy: switching from drugs to tea.
In the "Gazgolder" project, Denis experimented with genres and explored various principles of collective action, which he would repeatedly use in his future exhibition projects. At the GazGallery from 2006-2009, several modern cultures interpenetrated: contemporary art, actual rap, and dance rave culture. The idea behind the mixture was to create a unified field of contemporary underground culture in Moscow, including their own urban quarter. During this time, the "Gazgolder" performers Noggano and Basta soared, and the Arma dance festival appeared, which determined the development of Russian rave culture for years to come.
In 2007, as an artist participating with the work "Enlightenment” in "I Believe" Exhibition (Winzavod Center for Contemporary Art, Moscow, Russia) Denis met curator Oleg Kulik, and this marked the beginning of their long collaboration.
In 2009, together with Oleg Kulik, Denis staged a production for the 100th anniversary of the Diaghilev Seasons in Paris on the stage of the Théâtre du Châtelet, where the Diaghilev Seasons originally took place. The artists created a contemporary liturgy to the music of Claudio Monteverdi's 1610 "Vespers." The play involved super-contemporary video projection and sound technology.
Denis decided to focus more on his personal creative career, left "Gazgolder," and started devoting more time to his career as a director and artist. He participated in various exhibitions, such as the 4th Moscow Biennale in 2010, "Arkhstoyanie-2010: Nine Muses of the Labyrinth," the 54th Venice Biennale at Scuola Grande di San Rocco Campo San Rocco XVI (Venice, Italy), the First Kiev Biennale "Arsenale" at Mystetskyi Arsenal (Kyiv, Ukraine), and others.
At the same time, he continued to make documentary and art-house movies: the film "I Believe," which shows an exhibition through the eyes of an artist; in 2010, the film-opera "Vespers of the Blessed Virgin," filmed in Paris at the Théâtre du Châtelet; the mockumentary "Alive" about the world of Russian contemporary art, and more.
In 2012, as a curator, he creates a new creative union, the Foundation for Cultural Innovation "Saturnaliy." The foundation holds the First Moscow Saturnalia in 2012, in the Moschaos space. The union created exhibitions as a collective work, without leaving signatures under the works and holding exhibitions in the most unexpected places. Exhibitions were held four times a year at the solar cross and gathered constant public interest. Each exhibition was visited by thousands of people. In 2013, Foundation’s collective exhibition "Tetractys" was included in the program of the 5th Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art. The "Saturnaliy" Foundation held sessions of collective creation, where artists created their own pieces in joint work.
In 2015, Denis, along with his co-author Olga Loianich, launched the film company "Radragon". The company's first project in 2015 was "Ammonite," the mini-series about urban magic, which consisted of small episodes of varying lengths and allowed viewers to piece the plot together on their own.
At the same time, Denis studied screenwriting and worked as a film editor for the well-known film director Sergey Mokritsky in order to better understand the profession. The "Radragon" studio is exploring various genres, and in 2018, as a director, Denis shot his first theatrical film, the full-length action movie "Russian Raid," with a focus on action choreography. Denis has been practicing martial arts since childhood, and this helped him to film honest fight scenes, perhaps for the first time in history of Russian cinema. The film became a hit on Russian television, was released worldwide, and was the first Russian action film to be released in the last 10 years.
In 2021, Denis directed the mystical drama "Whirlpool," which is based on the story of a provincial girl trying to break free from the familiar atmosphere of domestic violence and ending up in a Vedic sect.
Currently, Denis is working on feature and documentary films and preparing a personal exhibition.