Category: Architecture

Bezalel Academy of Arts & Design Jerusalem

Established in 1906 by artist Boris Schatz as the “Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts”, Bezalel has evolved into one of the world’s most prestigious art schools. The name Bezalel is synonymous with more than 100 years of Israeli art, innovation
and academic excellence. Bezalel’s unique strength stems from the numerous breakthroughs it has been responsible for and its ability to respond and adapt to cultural changes. It takes pride in its numerous generations of graduates – the spearhead of Israeli artists, designers and architects, in Israel and around the globe. The Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design is, first and foremost, a group of talented, inspired and motivated artists and professionals. Both faculty and students are driven by a passion to create and by their dedication to quality and excellence. These two pillars of the Academy have placed Bezalel at the epicenter of Israel’s
cultural discourse and at the forefront of its artistic scene, making it instrumental in shaping the country’s cultural identity.

Bezalel has over 2000 students studying towards undergraduate degrees in the following departments: Fine Arts, Screen Based Arts, Architecture, Ceramics and Glass Design, Industrial Design, Jewelry and Fashion Design, Photography and Visual Communication. In addition, Bezalel offers graduate degrees in the fields of Fine Arts, Urban Design, Industrial Design and Policy and Theory of the Arts. Each department preserves the traditional knowledge, tools, materials and workshops collected over many decades, while using state-of-the-art software and cutting-edge technologies.

Bezalel trains and prepares its students for a life of achievement and excellence. Our students receive a practical education of the highest order, along with a broad-based intellectual foundation in history, literature and philosophy, social studies and the fundamentals of scientific and technological thought. Through interdisciplinary, inter-departmental and ‘basics’ courses and the option of enrolling in courses in all of Bezalel’s departments, our students are introduced to additional fields, outside of their specialized field, thereby enriching their artistic-design understanding. The Bezalel Academy has an outstanding faculty as well as an extensive variety of expressive tools, providing our students with total freedom of choice and creative liberty. By the time they graduate, they are able to effectively cope with the challenges presented by the global world of the 21st century and succeed in blazing their own unique and individual trails through the magical – yet demanding – fields of art, architecture and design.

Read more

Chedva Kleinhandler

Founder at Emerj

I’m the founder of Emerj, a startup with one clear goal: make work – better. This is a life mission for me and my team, built out of our own experiences as well as of the 600 people from 56 countries that shared (and continue sharing) their experiences with us.
Our solution is an app that connects between employees and mentors for always relevant, always confidential career advice on demand. This would help not only with economic empowerment, but would also build more diverse, more productive and more efficient businesses with inherent growth, and with reduced employee turnover.

Before Emerj (which was previously called Lean On), I helped local brands take the leap and become recognizable abroad by tweaking their social media, content strategy and connections with bloggers and magazines.

Specialties: Blogging, blogger outreach, content strategy, Twitter, Pinterest, Shopify.

I’m the former co-founder of #InsightMediaIL – a social media workshop series for lifestyle business owners and creative entrepreneurs. I started my design blog Rooms and Words on 2010 (after blogging since 2007) and since then I’ve written and blogged for various magazines, brands and online publications.

Read more

Dan Handel

Architect & Curator of Design and Architecture at The Israel Museum

Dan Handel is an architect and the inaugural Young Curator at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, for which he developed the exhibition “First, the Forests.” He also curated the Israeli pavilion at the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale. He has written in Thresholds, Bracket, Frame, San Rocco, Pin-Up, the Journal of Landscape Architecture and Cabinet, among others. He is the editor of Aircraft Carrier (Hajte Cantz, 2012), and of Manifest, an upcoming journal of American architecture and urbanism.

Read more

Elie Derman

Co Founder at Derman Verbakel Architecture

Elie Derman, founding partner of Derman Verbakel Architecture, has taught architecture and urban design at Pratt Institute, New York, Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem, New Jersey School of Architecture, Technion Institute of Technology, Haifa and Colman College, Rishon LeTsyon. His work and writings have been published in Tel Aviv Magazine, 42 degrees Design Magazine, Urban Life (Architectural League of New York), AD Magazine Fall 2005, New Urbanisms 6 (Columbia University), World Forum on Urbanizing World, UN Human Habitat II,Aplus and Architettura Naturale. He obtained a Bachelor of Architecture Degree at Bezalel Academy of Art and Design (Jerusalem, 1998) where he graduated with excellence and a Master of Science in Architecture and Urban Design at Columbia University (New York, 2001), where he received the Excellence in Design Award as well as the Lowenfisch Prize for Best Final Design Project. Elie was born in Canada and grew up in Israel. He lived for six years in New York before returning to Tel Aviv.

Read more

Els Verbakel

Architect at Derman Verbakel Architecture

Els Verbakel, founding partner of Derman Verbakel Architecture is a lecturer in architecture at Technion Institute of Technology and currently pursuing a PhD in Architecture at Princeton University. She has taught architecture and urban design at Columbia University, Princeton University, Pratt Institute, the University of Leuven and Bezalel Academy. In 2007 she published the book Constellations: Constructing Urban Design Practices and in 2008 she guest-edited a special issue of AD Magazine titled Cities of Dispersal. In 2003 she was a J. Clawson Mills Research Fellow at the Architectural League of New York where she prepared the exhibition Urban Life. Housing in the Contemporary City. Els’ research and design work has been published internationally in magazines such as AD Magazine (UK), Lotus (IT), Oase (NL), Archis (NL), Block (IS) and others. Els obtained a Masters in Civil Engineering and Architecture from the University of Leuven (Belgium, 1999), a Postgraduate in Urban Design from the Polytechnic Institute of Catalunya (Barcelona, 2000) and a Master of Science in Architecture and Urban Design from Columbia University (New York, 2001). Els was born and grew up in Belgium, has lived in Barcelona and for six years in New York before moving to Tel Aviv.

Read more

Erez Ella

Architect at HQ Architects

Erez Ella is an architect and the founder of HQ Architects studio in Tel Aviv which was established in 2008 and practices architecture, urbanism, and cultural research. In a short time HQ gained reputation for designing and completing innovative buildings that are resource efficient and cultural challenging. Ella also serves as the head of Architecture: Construction: Environment research unit in Bezalel school of Architecture where he examines questions of Architecture in regional context. Prior to establishing HQ, Ella worked as a Principal of REX between 2006 and 2008 and was an Associate at OMA P.C. Ella was a prolific contributor to both offices, winning proposal for the CCTV in Beijing, Whitney museum in NY and the Wyly theater in Dallas TX. He was the co-curator of the Israeli pavilion at the 2012 Venice Bienalle of architecture, and is the editor of the publication Aircraft Carrier (Hajte Cantz, 2012).

Read more

Fresh Paint Art Fair

Changing its location every year, this annual event is the largest art event Tel Aviv has to offer. Fresh Paint Fair mixes the big and the small together, when the small galleries are working side by side with the large museums to bring you an art fair you won’t forget. With the support of leading international art institutes, Fresh Paint Fair attracts more than 30,000 art ­lovers every year.

The fair brings together leading Israeli galleries and significant forces of the Israeli art scene, collaborates with all the Israeli museums, and enjoys the support of leading international art institutions. The fair’s visitors enjoy presentations of the nation’s top galleries, promising emerging galleries and the unique Greenhouse – showcasing the works of select, independent Israeli artists. While following the formula of professional art fairs around the world, Fresh Paint is unique in its role as a launch pad for the careers of up-and-coming, unrepresented artists. The fair’s community projects and fund-raising activities benefit the Tel Aviv Museum of Art and several other nonprofit organizations. Fresh Paint contemporary art fair is an extraordinary opportunity to get to know the energetic Israeli art scene.

Read more

Irit Fine Sommer

Owner at Sommer Contemporary Art Gallery

Irit Fine-Sommer is the founder and owner of Sommer Contemporary Art gallery. Today, Sommer Contemporary Art is a first rank international gallery and an important cultural landmark in the city of Tel Aviv. Irit Sommer is also the founder of Art TLV, the First Israeli art biennial and a member of the board of Muzot high school for the Arts. She was born and raised in Switzerland to a family of art collectors. At the age of 19 she moved to Paris and studied French culture and architecture at the Sorbonne. Upon graduation she moved to Israel and completed her BA in Business and Economics and her MA Studies in Environmental Economics and History at the Tel-Aviv University. In 1999, after three years of intensive preparatory work, she opened Sommer Contemporary Art.

Read more

Irit Kohavi

Founder at Irit Kohavi Architects

Architect Irit Kohavi is one of the leading and most experienced architects in Israel. She is the manager of Arch. Moshe Safdie’s Jerusalem office, a senior partner and part of the management team of the Boston-based international Safdie office. Amongst her unforgettable designs are the Yad Va’Shem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, Ben Gurion International Airport in Israel, the Mamilla Hotel and shopping complex, Modi’in city center and more. Irit believes in holistic architecture from the urban scale, through the building and materials, to the individual; while developing new materials and technologies for local manufacturing. She graduated the Technion University with honors, as well as the University of Pennsylvania.

Read more

Meira Kowalsky

Founder at Efrat Kowalsky Architects

Meira Kowalsky has extensive experience in the design of public and private buildings of varying scales. She specializes in planning museums and exhibition spaces, and has worked as an architect or consultant with these institutions among others: The Jewish Museum, New York; The Holocaust Museum, Washington DC; The Ramat Gan Museum of Art; The Herzelia Museum of Art; City Museum of Rehovot; The Tel Aviv Museum of Art; Ein Harod Museum; Beit Lohmei HaGetaot; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem; City Museum Tel Aviv.

Read more

Michal Helfman

Artist

Michal Helfman (born 1973 in Tel Aviv) is an Israeli artist living and working in Tel Aviv, Israel. She is a multidisciplinary artist working in various disciplines including sculpture, architecture, video and drawings. In order to demonstrate the relations between the reviled and the hidden forces working within society and culture, she has developed an installation platform based on the back-stage front-stage structure of the theatrical stage as one, which brings together simultaneously both the real and the symbolic.

Read more

Nirith Nelson

Contemporary Art & Design Curator

Nirith Nelson is an independent contemporary art and design curator, as well as an active and wide-ranging art educator. In line with her role as the art director of the JCVA Residency Program, much of her prominent curatorial work is notable for its international, multi-disciplinary approach.  Nelson studied Art History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. During her studies for the master’s degree she began her work at the Israel Museum, where for nearly ten years she practiced curatorial work and public speaking on art and design. Since 2002, she has run and developed the JCVA Artists Residency program, where she screens and invites international artists and curators and creates individually-tailored programs for each in line with their artistic interests. Special projects such as exhibitions, lectures, workshops and multidisciplinary seminars are initiated and encouraged; these enrich visiting artists as well as the local art milieu.

Read more

Ran Wolf

CEO at Ran Wolf Urban Planning & Project Management

Ran Wolf urban planning and project management specializes in leading and overseeing urban and environmental renewal processes. These processes are promoted and accompanied while offering comprehensive consulting services to their initiating bodies. The firm encourages the potential embedded in the interchange of the site and community, helping to bring about processes of change and renewal. The Jerusalem Development Fund has undertaken the restoration and renovation works at The Hansen Hospital. Managed by the ‘Ran Wolf’ Company, this listed monument is set to transform from a former hospital into a home for design, technology and media, which will introduce exhibitions, research and academic activities into its historic buildings and unique garden.

Read more

Sergio Edelzstein

Director & Chief Curator at The Center for Contemporary Art

Sergio Edelsztein was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1956. Studied at the Tel Aviv University (1976-85). Funded and directed Artifact Gallery in Tel Aviv (1987-1995). In 1995 founded The Center for Contemporary Art in Tel Aviv and has been its director and chief curator since then. In the framework of the CCA he curated seven Performance Art Biennials and five International Video Art Biennials – Video Zone. Also curated numerous experimental and video art screenings, retrospectives and performance events. Since 1995 curated exhibitions and time-based events in Spain, China, Poland, Singapore and elsewhere. Curated the Israeli participation at the 24th Sao Paulo Biennial (1998) the 2005 and 2013 Israeli Pavilion at the Biennale in Venice.

Read more

Sommer Contemporary Art Gallery

Sommer Contemporary Art was founded in 1999 by Irit Fine Sommer. Since its opening the gallery has been committed to promoting Israeli artists in the international art scene, as well as representing and exhibiting leading international artists in Israel and abroad. The gallery is distinguished by the deep relationships it develops with artists, from emerging and mid-career to established, by regularly collaborating with museums, biennials and publishing houses, and creating meaningful exhibitions and publications. International artists are often invited by the gallery to conduct extensive research and create specially-curated projects. They regularly present site-specific installations in the gallery’s space, works that are formed out of a continuing dialogue and that cannot be witnessed in other venues. In addition to these,Sommer Contemporary Art aims to bring artistic exchange, experimentation and discussion to the forefront. In the gallery’s project room, “S2”, young curators receive an opportunity to curate small scale exhibitions of emerging artists. The purpose of this initiative is to support the curatorial role and allow for diverse theoretical discussion to take place within the gallery compounds.

Read more

Uri Cohen

Architect

Postgraduate in Urban Design from the Polytechnic Institute of Catalunya (Barcelona, 2000) and a Master of Science in Architecture and Urban Design from Columbia University (New York, 2001). Els was born and grew up in Belgium, has lived in Barcelona and for six years in New York before moving to Tel Aviv. Uri Cohen graduated from the TU Delft, the Netherlands (MsC architecture, MsC town planning) in 1992. He worked at Steven Holl Architects (New-York), Soeters architecten (Amsterdam) and Herman Hertzberger architecture studio (Amsterdam). In 1995 he opened his own practice in Amsterdam and in 2007 he opened his own practice in Israel. His Office works on projects in various scales; private houses, renovation and reservations projects, urban planning and schools. He won various competitions: 2010 Archeological house, Ramat Ishay (First prize), 2010 Chabad school, Nazareth Ilit (First prize) 2012 Tachkemoni school, Teberias (First prize), 2013 mentally ill daycare, Beer Sheeva (Honorable mention). Uri teaches at the TU Delft and Technion (Haifa)

Read more

Zvi Efrat

Founder at Efrat Kowalsky Architects

Prof. Zvi Efrat, Architect and Architectural Historian, was Head of the Department of Architecture at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem (2002-2010). He has taught at the Technion Institute of Technology, the Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University, among others. He has lectured worldwide, published extensively in various periodicals and books, and curated numerous exhibitions in Israel and in Europe. His book, The Israeli Project: Building and Architecture 1948-1973, was published in 2004.

Read more

Contact us: vibedata@vibeisrael.com   |   Terms & Conditions   |   Developed by Digiproduct - Digital Production House