Achilles Rizzoli

Achilles Gildo Rizzoli (1896–1981), anonymous during his lifetime, has since his death become celebrated as an outsider artist. He is an unusual example of an "outsider" artist who had considerable formal training in drawing.

Born in Point Reyes, California, Rizzoli lived in San Francisco, where he was employed as an architectural draftsman. In the 1930s he showed his work in exhibits held in his home, which he called the Achilles Tectonic Exhibit Portfolio (A.T.E.P.) After his death, a group of elaborate drawings came to light, many in the form of maps and architectural renderings that described an imaginary world exposition (much of which was designated "Y.T.T.E.", for "Yield To Total Elation"). The drawings include "portraits" of his mother (whom he lived with until her death in 1937) and neighborhood children "symbolically sketched" in the form of fanciful neo-baroque buildings.

Rizzoli published one novel, The Colonnade (1931), under the pseudonym Peter Metermaid.

A film was made about his life and work, called Yield to Total Elation: The Life and Art of Achilles Rizzoli.

External links

• Web site for the film Yield to Total Elation
• The Ames Gallery the Artists profile of A.G. Rizzoli
• The New York Times review of 1998 Rizzoli exhibit at Museum of American Folk Art in New York City.
• Achilles G. Rizzoli : biography, bibliography, filmography, links at the Biography Project, popsubculture.com.

References

Cover of A. G. Rizzoli: Architect of Magnificent Visions

• Jo Farb Hernandez; John Beardsley; Roger Cardinal. A. G. Rizzoli: Architect of Magnificent Visions. Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1997. ISBN 0-8109-4293-3 (trade cloth binding) and ISBN 0-937108-20-0 (paperback).
• Sarah F. Maclaren (2007). "L'architettura magnifica di Achilles G. Rizzoli". Ágalma. Rivista di studi culturali e di estetica, 14, 2007: 42–57. ISBN 978-88-8353-599-4. In Italian.
• Elsa Longhauser; Harald Szeemann; Lee Kogan (1998). Self Taught Artists of the 20th Century: An American Anthology, Museum of American Folk Art. Chronicle Books. pp. 84 ff. ISBN 0-8118-2098-X.