By JENNIFER GREENBERG‘Spirit of Tel Aviv.’(photo credit: MECÁNICA DISTRIBUTIVA ART PROJECT)
Tel Aviv is a fast-paced city. Everyone is constantly on the move from point A to point B, Allenby to Rothschild, Dizengoff to Azrieli. Perhaps a character strikes interest in transit – a street musician trying to make a shekel or the older woman with the white foundation. However, these people are fleeting, unstable. Now, the Bauhaus buildings, Dizengoff’s fountain, the Rainbow Hotel, these are the stable icons that define Tel Aviv’s colorful personality, something Shirley Pavell-Gilboa and Ido Biran recognized in their new exhibition, “White City in Full Color.”The intimate gallery space nestled at the back of the Prima Tel Aviv Hotel contains a color palette of mixed media works, paintings, digital illustrations, photography, and a handful of other media that piece together the White City’s architecture, alleys, and special moments into an “urban mosaic.”The Cat depicts a bohemian cat traveling the shady White City streets in the dead of night, pitting black against white. “These artworks contribute to the diversity of colors and perspective in the exhibition,” explains Biran. “Black and white are colors too, after all.”‘Metzitzim Beach,’ digital illustration. (VERED GANCHROW)David Szerer relies on found objects to bring new life to abandoned furniture just waiting to be reborn. His project, TLVwood, manually transfers photographs to wood, varnished for a smooth finish.While Szerer conquers more complex techniques, Zohar Flax finds beauty in the untouched simplicity of quotidian life, visible in her oil paintings. One final standout is the vibrant oeuvre conceived by a Cuban-Mexican collective, whose creative energy flows through the waters of the recently removed Dizengoff fountain in their nostalgic depiction of a landmark long gone.Whether the artist hails from Cuba, Russia, Turkey, or the apartment down the street, each has a unique way of viewing the White City’s many faces. The exhibition’s diversity of innovators and mediums reflects the Mediterranean urban spirit. While each finished product works as a separate entity, they also come together to produce a new artwork; a comprehensive collage with the city as its main subject, one that existed in the past, persists in the present, and shares glimpses into the future.“White City in Full Color” is the second in a series of exhibitions on display at the Prima Gallery for Local Art, located inside the Prima Hotel, 105 Hayarkon Street, Tel Aviv, until November 30.
