James Rizzi Art Study ‘How Do You Do’ 2002. Authentic black ink & watercolor study on structured Ingres paper.

✓ Hand Signed & Dated

This item was bought in 2006 at the OK Harris Gallery, NY and comes with COA from the Gallery.

• Measuring 18″ x 12.8″ (45 x 32cm)

INFORMATION ON JAMES RIZZI

James Rizzi (October 5, 1950 – December 26, 2011) was an American pop artist who was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York.

James Rizzi studied Fine Arts at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. He came up with the idea of 3D multiples now mostly associated with his name when, having taken classes in painting, printmaking and sculpturing, he had to hand in grade work for all three subjects, but only had time for doing one. So he created an etching, printed it twice, hand colored it, and mounted parts of the one print on top of the other, using wire as a means of adding depth. Having received good grades from all three teachers, he stuck with the idea and developed it further.

Later, he married Gaby Hamill, a fashion designer. They later divorced. James Rizzi never had any children of his own, but has two nieces Jennifer Fishman and Laura Rizzi and one nephew Brian Rizzi who is also his godson. Finally a goddaughter Georgia Rae Pai Foster, daughter of Emrie Brooke Foster.

Rizzi was most famous for his 3D artwork, “especially the large, elaborate prints and teeming anthropomorphic cityscapes. His merry maximalism and delight in delirious detail and elaborate minutiae created a true art brand, a trademark style as recognizable as any in the world.”

Late in life, he returned to painting. His “latest paintings combine his Picasso meets Hanna-Barbera drawing style with an increasingly chromatic palette and a complex graphic structure that simultaneously evokes cubism and the most sophisticated Amerindian friezes.

PORTFOLIO OF INTERNATIONAL WORKS

Publication of “The New York Paintings” book. Rizzi is the official artist of the 1996 Olympic Summer Games in Atlanta, Georgia. He designs the exterior shell of a Boeing 757 for Lufthansa’s charter airline Condor Airlines – the “Rizzi Bird”.

Official artist for the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland. Retrospective in Brooklyn, New York at the Mill Basin Kosher Deli and Gallery.

Artist of the year, United States Sports Academy. Official Artist, FIFA World Cup, France.

Design of three Volkswagen New Beetles for Volkswagen. Design of covers for 15 volume Brockhaus encyclopedia.

Participation in CowParade, New York City. Work for UNICEF and the Japanese Railway.

Opening of the “Happy Rizzi House”, an office building designed by Rizzi in Braunschweig, Germany.

Front page design for a newspaper in Hamburg, Germany. Design of a Teddy bear for Steiff. Design of three light railway cars for city of Heilbronn.

Rizzi is the first living artist ever to be commissioned by the German government to create official postage stamps for Germany.

Retrospective exhibition of Rizzi’s work in the Rheingold Hall in Mainz, Germany – the largest Rizzi exhibition ever with over 1,000 pieces of artwork on display.