Curator Meital Aviram Transforms Her Tel Aviv Apartment into a Gallery
Before conceiving her residential-based seasonal project Third Floor on The Left, curator Meital Aviram was working with leading curators in the Israeli art scene. Aviram started as an assistant curator for Noam Segal, in Anri Sala's solo show No Names, No Title at the Helena Rubinstein Pavilion for Contemporary art, Tel Aviv Museum of Art. She also worked with Nicola Trezzi, former Head of the MFA faculty at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, as part of the Miryam Nissenholtz gallery project space of the MFA program in 2015.
Image: Meital Aviram. Credit: Assaf Hinden
Motivated to create something of her own, she built a gallery in her own Tel Aviv apartment. Her gallery became a success in the local art scene, mainly because of the unconventional ways in which she works. “I have founded Third Floor on The Left in 2017 and it has been my main curating since,” Avraim said. “Meeting the lack of independent exhibition spaces has brought me to conceive this project, transforming my habitat to an exhibition space.”
Aviram likes to work with emerging artists and she chooses them carefully – every year marks a season for the gallery, and each season showcases a linear exhibition. This means every exhibition that is planned is essentially a continuation of the previous concept. “I have developed the exhibitions of the first season of Third Floor on the Left as one unit, and also wanted to maintain all exhibitions at the same space,"Aviram noted. “I choose the artists for this project not according to experience nor status, but artists who I have a real curiosity for their praxis and are open to collaborate and cultivate a 'relationship' with me.”
In 2019, Aviram received a special grant from the Joshua Rabinowitz Foundation for the Arts of Tel Aviv, as well as a grant from the Israel Lottery Council for Culture and Arts Grant for her project. But the importance of this support is more than just financial, it has proven the good work Aviram has done and continues to do in the field.
Two other exhibitions will be added this season, P.O.P- Philosophy of Poverty and Ahitophel. The first is a solo exhibition by artist Lior Waterman. The latter showcases a group artist's stay. Aviram's upcoming projects include curating a solo exhibition by Michael Liani at the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art.
