Rinaldo Paluzzi

Rinaldo Paluzzi.1959

Rinaldo Paluzzi (May 27, 1927 – March 27, 2013) was an American-Spanish Abstract Art and Geometric abstraction painter and sculptor in the post-World War II era. He was born in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, and died in Madrid, Spain.

Education and works

After serving in the U.S. Navy during WWII, he was a student at the John Herron School of Art (now part of the Indiana University) from 1948 to 1950. He then left to attend the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome Italy until the end of 1951. After returning to the Herron, he received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1953. He remained at the Herron, where in 1957 he was awarded a Master of Fine Arts.

The following is from the: The Herron Chronicle (published in 2003).

Twenty-seven students received their diplomas and degrees at commencement on June 9, 1957. One of the graduates in attendance was Rinalo (Randy) Paluzzi who received his MFA that day and a top $2,000 Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation grant. He was just as surprised as anyone that such honors were coming to him, considering that a mere eight years before he had been at home in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, discharged from the Navy, with no high school diploma, no clear prospects, and no interest in art at all. His elder brother Guarino had just transferred to Herron, and he suggested that Randy use his G.I. Bill and follow him there. Paluzzi recalled that his first drawings in Harry Davis' class were "terrible." Since the Tiffany grant could be used without restrictions, Paluzzi decided to spend it in Italy, parceling it out to last a full year. Aiming to take his wife, former classmate Claudine Kelsey, and his three infant daughters along, and realizing the grant would not stretch that far, he spent the summer of 1957 working 12-hour shifts driving a mail truck to raise another $1,000. The Paluzzis left for Rome on October 2.[1]

Upon their return to Greensburg, a local gallery devoted a showing in Indianapolis to all 65 painting he had finished during that year away.

Sculpture Totem.

Although Paluzzi was not part of the movement, his paintings from the late 1950s through the 1960s were connected with Abstract Expressionism. [2]

He is best known in the United States for “Totem” Totem (Paluzzi) a 32 x 5 x 5 foot stainless steel sculpture located in Celebration Plaza, White River State Park, Indianapolis, Indiana. Made of stainless steel, it is a triangular shaped vertical tube with triangular and trapezoidal cut-outs in the steel. It was constructed in 1982, and sits centered atop a concrete circle, 40 feet in diameter, with a sundial face.

Paluzzi’s works are in dozens of permanent collections, from the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden at the Smithsonian to the Union Fenosa Museum of Contemporary Art in Coruna, Spain.[3]

According to his obituary in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, he was “internationally known for his artistic talents and his paintings and sculptures are on display in Amsterdam. Paris, Spain, Switzerland, California and Indiana.”[4] A video of Paluzzi in his studio is in External Links (Vimeo) below.

Rinaldo Paluzzi in his studio (1962)

Most Recent Individual Exhibitions


Most Recent Collective Exhibitions

black & white photograph of a painting titled Icarus, by Rinaldo Paluzzi (1959)




Museum Collections

Rinaldo Paluzzi, Vertical Construction (1960) (24” x 48”)


References

  1. ↑ Pages 127-130 of The Herron Chronicle by Harriet Warkel, Martin Krause, and S.L. Berry with an index by Jennifer L. Hehman, ISBN 0-25334237-6
  2. ↑ Associate Dean and Professor of Fine Art, Herron School of Art and Design, Indianapolis, Indiana.
  3. ↑ http://www.javierbmartin.com/index.php/pintores-javier-b-martin/222-rinaldo-paluzzi
  4. ↑ http://obituaries.triblive.com/listing/223617/Rinaldo-Paluzzi/
  5. ↑ http://www.javierbmartin.com/index.php/pintores-javier-b-martin/222-rinaldo-paluzzi
  6. ↑ http://www.javierbmartin.com/index.php/pintores-javier-b-martin/222-rinaldo-paluzzi
  7. ↑ http://www.javierbmartin.com/index.php/pintores-javier-b-martin/222-rinaldo-paluzzi
  8. ↑ http://www.nortonsimon.org/search/index.php?q=Rinaldo+Paluzzi&x=20&y=9
  9. ↑ http://www.cmoa.org/CollectionSearch.aspx?srch=Rinaldo%20Paluzzi
  10. ↑ http://www.imamuseum.org/search/ima/Rinaldo
  11. ↑ The Evansville Museum has one work by Mr. Rinaldo Paluzzi, a lithograph made in 1957 titled “Tevere, Rome, Italy”. The work was purchased in 1961 from the museum’s Mid-States Art Exhibition
  12. ↑ http://collection.wmuseumaa.org/Art476?sid=1029&x=96905
  13. ↑ Purdue University Galleries has one work signed on the back, titled "Spatial Construction and dated Madrid 1973." It is constructed of 2 wood panels 150cm high and 75cm wide, hinged together, so it would be 150cm wide if flattened out.
  14. ↑ http://www.hirshhorn.si.edu/search-results/?edan_search_value=Rinaldo%20Paluzzi
  15. ↑ http://kam.illinois.edu/search/index.html

External links