Gili Avissar is a multi-disciplinary artist, born in 1980 in Haifa and currently based in Tel Aviv. Avissar received a BFA and MFA from the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem and since then has been creating large-scale textile installations and videos.

Avissar’s practice shifts between object-making and performance. His process includes a deep investigation into materials and movement, as he turns every work inside out, rearranging it in intense and colorful compositions. Sculpture, installation, and video performance are his main tools for uncovering the work’s flesh.

He uses the exhibition space’s characteristics as his temporary boundaries, and works in an existential state of nomadism, which is key to his practice of creating unfixed environments that he perceives as places to build, reside in, and finally transform.

His work in the studio resembles that of a one man factory engaged in mass production. He collects remnants of fabric, paper, wood, cardboard, and plastic materials that are available everywhere. These materials are stitched and assembled into shapes that will later become objects. This action is on the verge of compulsion – creation deriving from fear of being emptied out. His motivation is working, not only as a process, but as subject matter.

A selected list of Avissar’s solo exhibitions includes museums and galleries in Israel and abroad: MEWO Kunsthalle, Memmingen, Germany (2018); Kostka Gallery, Prague (2018); Koal Gallery, Berlin (2017); the Nahum Gutman Museum, Tel Aviv (2015). Their works have been featured in many group exhibitions and video screenings, including Artist’s Television Access, San Francisco (2018); Mana Contemporary, Chicago (2017); KARST contemporary art venue, Plymouth; Flux Factory, New York (2015); Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv (2014); and Museum of Sculpture Glaskasten Marl, Marl, Germany (2013).

Avissar is the recipient of The Israeli Ministry of Culture and Sport Prize for Young Artists (2012); The Rabinovich Art Foundation Award (2012, 2010) and the Isracrard and Tel Aviv Museum Prize for Israeli Artist (2010). His works are kept in private and institutional collections such as the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Sammlung PHILARA, Düsseldorf; the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art.