Aldo Vidali

Aldo Vidali

In 1930, Aldo was born to an Italian family in Ixelles, Belgium. As a child he went to Italy and from there he began his life of traveling. His travels have taken him to almost every continent in the world. He has studied at the University of Bologna, the University of Rome in Italy, and studied Mining and Engineering in the Colorado School of Mines. He broke into the film business and as a director, traveled to Africa, Italy, and the Naussa Space Center in Texas, “where I made commercials for Standard Oil Company,” says Aldo. In 1968, Aldo landed in Topanga Canyon, California. “It’s the longest time I’ve spent in one place,” he remarks.

The place Aldo now calls home, is nestled behind a row of trees approximately 200 yards from the ocean on Topanga Canyon Boulevard. On his grounds, Aldo has surrounded himself with signs of his interests and beliefs. He and his Swiss-born wife, Nuri, have built an original Sioux Indian teepee. "We had the materials shipped to us from Montana,” says Aldo. “Nuri sewed the covering material, and we each painted our symbols on the door. Her symbol, a buffalo, on the outside, and mine, a peyote bird, on the inside.”

I can see that the teepee is a place where Aldo can go to get away from it all and as he says, “understand the rhythms of my physical surroundings.” My eyes drift around Aldo’s home and working environment and onto the biggest and most exciting of Aldo Vidali’s endeavors, the fifty-foot concrete and iron sailboat that he has been building since 1971.

(from "Aloha Aldo", Messenger, 1978-10-19)

1978

Messenger, 1978-10-19

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Tom Mitchell

Messenger