Color, oil paint, is the main issue in my art. Color as a matter that can be sculpted, shaped, engraved and shoveled. In most of my paintings  color is strong and dominant, while line and composition – though not neglected – are secondary. 

In addition to canvas, I often paint on old books, bibles, art books, monetarynotes, accountbooks, comics, etc. I'm intrigued by text, print and painting relations. Perhaps because I was a bookworm as a child, I enjoy erasing words with paint as a kind of renewed self-definition.

Being a 20th century product, realism, modernism, and abstract are my points of reference, and the periods that influenced and shaped me. I create from an internal place, but the traditions of art and their history are familiar to me and presence clearly in my background. I believe that art cannot be created in a vacuum.

At first, my paintings were figurative. The bible and mythology were the subjects that interested me the most. Furthermore, I drew from observation. In the past few years, I've become more absorbed in the abstract. Basic forms intrigue me, I keep reverting to them obsessively and never quench. The free play and the relations between shapes and  colors are what I relish.

I enjoy creating series. They release me from the need to decide What to draw and let me concentrate and work solely on the How. I go back again and again to a certain form or composition and explore it thoroughly. 

When I work, I'm surprised by the gap between intention and outcome, the produce of the matter's will, objection and point of view. In some  moments, when the action streams off effortlessly, I feel myself become a mere instrument; I'm only a tube, or an insignificant mediator. These are rare moments of exaltation. 

Ori Aviram has been painting non-stop for over twenty-five years.

Born in 1965 in Jerusalem and after a short career as a producer and editor in television and the advertising world, he decided to dedicate himself to art.

As an artist, he has worked over the years with various types of media – sculpture, assemblage, collage, drawing and painting. Today, his work is characterized by large formats in oil paints, with the paintings moving from figurative to expressive abstract. Alongside these, there are also series of paintings on book pages, scriptures, bills and more, so that their past becomes an inseparable part of the creation of new art.

Cultural connections, including Biblical stories and local and Western art history, recur repeatedly in his work and correspond with his rich emotional world. Aviram presents solo exhibitions and participates in group exhibitions in museums, galleries and alternative spaces. His works and interviews with him have been published in a variety of international magazines and his works appear in collections in Israel and abroad.