Many Cities, One Providence—Tel Aviv - From the seafoam and clouds to the here and now

Aug 27, 2026

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Many Cities, One Providence—Tel Aviv - From the seafoam and clouds to the here and now presents contemporary Tel Aviv artists exploring how the city’s layered visual past shapes present perspectives and future uncertainties. Centering on the Modernist White City and its Bauhaus/International Style heritage, the exhibition examines commissioned painting, collage, photography, sculpture, and installation. It traces origins in European Bauhaus dispersal, Zionist mythology, and later preservation, highlighting the tension between inspiring aesthetics and complex historical narratives.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryLifestyle

FormatPDF

Pages11

Reading Time17 min

AccessFree to download

Many Cities, One Providence—Tel Aviv - From the seafoam and clouds to the here and now

Participating artists and artworks

Bauhaus origins and dispersal to Palestine

The White City image, Zionism, and mythology

International Style in Tel Aviv and preservation efforts

TEL AVIV: FR M THE SEAF AM AND CL DS T THE HERE AND NW SEPTEMBER 11 – NVEMBER 16, DavidAdika Yael Efrati Hilla Toony Navok As InWater Face Reflects Face, From14:00To16:00, Extensions, 2018 PVC coated fabric, plastic chair. 2014 Metal window grill 2014 Photograph Many Cities, One Providence—Tel Aviv: From the seafoam and clouds to the here and now September 11th – November 16th, 2019 Participating artists: David Adika, Ronny Carny, Yael Efrati, Hilla Toony Navok & Shay Zilberman In the 1920s and 1930s, located primarily in the small town of Dessau, Weimar Republic, there was an art and design academy called Bauhaus. An avant-garde, international ethos dominated Bauhaus pedagogy, which combined crafts and the fine arts and espoused the International Style, an architecture based on the premise that it is possible to design and build a more just world. Among Bauhaus faculty, students and alumni were many Central and Eastern European Jews and descendants of Jewish pioneers from Palestine. When Adolf Hitler came to power and shut down the Bauhaus in 1933, its members were forced to disperse, and many of the Jews among them fled to Palestine. The legend—culled from the pages of books, lyrics of songs, and language of UNESCO—now goes that they went to ‘Little Tel Aviv,’a small city with few people and full of eclectic architecture. Here they revived Bauhaus principles and built themselves a ‘White City, from the seafoam and clouds.’ From the seafoam and clouds to the here and now examines how contemporary artists from Tel Aviv take as their subject the images and forms of their hometown’s complex visual history, especially that of the iconic area of Modernist structures: The White City, a collection of over 4,000 buildings built in a unique form of Bauhaus or International Style. Making with visual vocabularies and art histories that are simultaneously inspiring and problematic, these artists ultimately convey how their city’s origin story and embrace of Bauhaus is complexly intertwined with its mythology. Featuring all new artwork commissioned by Providence College Galleries [PC–G], the painting, collage, photography, sculpture and installation on display in this group exhibition consider the synthesis of Bauhaus goals and aesthetics with the ancient and contemporary cultures of the multi-cultural Middle East. Ronny Carny Death atOne’s Elbow, 2018 Painted wa l l mural Shay Zilberman Untitled, 2013 Paper Collage, Ink and Graphite on Paper A Painting in Black & White The artworks on display inTel Aviv: From theseafoam and clouds to the here and now are underpinned and connected by one city’s multifaceted past, dynamic present and uncertain future. Like any place, the mid-size metropolis of Tel Aviv exists as much in images, books, memories and dreams as it does in ever-evolving reality. Yet, Tel Aviv holds a unique position in urban history as one of the very few cities founded in the twentienth century. It is a distinctly modern city and a decidedly heterogeneous, secular and hedonistic place. Originally called Ahuzat Bayit, Tel- Aviv always aspired to be a Western metropolis and its early Jewish residents sought to realize the dual vision of creating both the first Hebrew city and the modernist urban plan of the West’s dreams in the East. Tel Aviv was therefore a design solution manifested to attract Jews who were forced to leave Europe but did not want to give up their urban, cosmopolitan cultures. The image of the White City in the world’s mind’s eye became that of the Jewish Venus—borne “from the seafoam and clouds,” the sun and sand, the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean sea—was first created by the Zionist movement. Sand and secular joined forces to mark Tel Aviv as a city liberated from the religious aspect of Israel and connected to a discourse of pioneering and settlement. The idea that Tel Aviv is a white city with no history, detached from its Palestinian roots, w

FAQs

What is the theme of the exhibition Many Cities, One Providence—Tel Aviv - From the seafoam and clouds to the here and now?

The exhibition examines how contemporary artists use Tel Aviv’s complex visual history, especially the Modernist White City, as subject matter.

Which kinds of artworks are featured in the exhibition?

The program includes commissioned works across painting, collage, photography, sculpture, and installation.

How does the exhibition connect Bauhaus history to Tel Aviv’s modern architecture?

It traces Bauhaus pedagogy and the dispersal of its members after 1933, then shows how International Style ideals helped shape Tel Aviv’s modern urban landscape.

Aug 27, 2026

Upload by Quinn