ARTIST CHRONOLOGY
U.S. passport photo of Aldo (left) with older brother Paul (1931)
1930 – 1945
Early Life
Aldo Tambellini was born in 1930 in Syracuse, New York. His father, John Tambellini, from Sao Paolo, Brazil, was born to Italian immigrant parents. Tambellini's mother, Gina, was born in Lucca, Italy. Unfortunately, when Tambellini was only 18 months old, his parents' troubled relationship and the presence of violence led Gina to legally separate from John. She returned to her family in Lucca, taking Aldo and his older brother Paul with her.
1946 - 1959
Return to America
After Tambellini and his family were liberated by the Buffalo Soldiers, Tambellini and his mother returned to America on the United States Naval Ship, Marine Carp. Upon their arrival, they were met by Tambellini’s father and the dysfunction of the family immediately recommenced. As a way to escape, Tambellini immersed himself in his art and eventually resumed his studies.
USNS Marine Carp (T-AP-199)
Tambellini delivers his manifesto at The Hall of Issues, NY, 1962
1959-1976
New York Years
“It was always my plan to go to New York City.”
-Aldo Tambellini
1976 – 1984
CAVS, MIT
During the period of 1976 to 1984, Tambellini held the position of Fellow at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies (CAVS) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Throughout this time, he not only taught courses and conducted workshops but also actively engaged in various media and communication events worldwide. This period proved to be highly conducive for Tambellini's interactive concepts to come to fruition.
In 1980, he established “Communicationsphere,” a network aimed at fostering collaboration among artists, technicians, engineers, performers, and individuals concerned with the effects of tele-communications on contemporary society.
Photo by Stephane Lam
1985-2008
Focus on Poetry
“As an artist, I respond to my inspirations, my thought and intuition. Often my creativity is triggered by headlines from newspapers or magazines… I capture language from overheard conversations, observe the world around me for news, trends and feelings… The age of 89 has certainly given me many experiences from which to draw material from, including: a major World War with air raids on my neighborhood, which I miraculously survived; relocation to my birth country where I felt like a stranger; the paranoia and hospitalization of my Mother (a collateral damage of war); the falling apart of my family; my own aging process and the political and power issues that are experienced by the population living in a land of discrimination, inequality, and disenfranchisement.”
-Aldo Tambellini, 2019
2008 – 2020
Rediscovered
In 2008,Tambellini's artistic contributions were rediscovered and welcomed by the art establishment that he had denounced throughout his life. His reemergence began with a retrospective of his films and videos at the Anthology Film Archive, NY, in the “Circuit Off” Program. The reperformance of his 1965 “Electromedia” event Black Zero at Performa 09 came shortly thereafter. That event was followed by solo shows at the Chelsea Art Museum, Black Zero, in 2011, Retracing Black, a large-scale installation accompanied by live performances at Tate Modern in 2012, Centre Pompidou, Aldo Tambellini Series: Back to Black in 2012,and We Are The Primitives Of A New Era, Paintings and Projections 1961-1989 at James Cohan Gallery, 2013. He was included in the Study of Internal Shapes and Outward Manifestations exhibit, in the Italian Pavilion at the 2015 Venice Biennale. In 2017 he exhibited Black Matters, the first full solo exhibition of American artist, Aldo Tambellini, one of the pioneers of intermedia art of the 1960s and 1970s at The ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe. At the end of Tambellini’s life, he was able to revisit his notebooks from the 60s, using them for inspiration, he completed his final creation, We are the Primitives of a New Era, a VR immersive project.
