"The 7th Floor"

The youngest son got very excited when I told him about "The 7th Floor" project, a graffiti and street art exhibition at the Central Bus Station in Tel Aviv. He was so keen to go and see the exhibition that we really didn't think too much about the location. Tel Aviv's Central Bus Station, once the largest bus station in the world, is located in the poorest part of the city and in recent years it has become somewhat neglected. Numerous drug addicts, prostitutes and homeless people have taken residence there. It was probably not the safest place to take the kids, but is also the reason why the street art exhibition was created there. As the exhibition poster states "We dream of transforming the Central Bus Station building from a symbol of grey massiveness into a place of surprise and colour." 

We had to be brave. Oh, and we took Mister Handmade in Israel with us.

To get to the exhibition we headed to the seventh floor, the top floor of the station where thousands of travellers arrive and depart each day. There we were greeted by 1,000 metres of painted walls created by 50 artists including Israel's best graffiti artists, as well as artists from abroad. We saw the work of Pil Peled, Maya Gelfman, Adi Sened and many more. It was interesting to compare and appreciate the differences in styles and techniques, and we enjoyed browsing the walls and choosing our favourites.

The aim of the exhibition is to raise public awareness of street art and was the vision of two Tel Avivians who wished to support the street art scene that has flourished in recent years in Jaffa-Tel Aviv. The idea is to change residents' attitudes toward their immediate environment. The explosion of colour, shapes and letters currently transforming the Central Bus Station building has certainly gone some way towards doing that, though there is clearly a long way to go.

After spending quite some time examining all the walls, we left quickly. We had thought about grabbing a quick falafel in the station but soon realised that it was not a place where we wanted hang out with the kids. We took the bus back to our home city instead and ate pizza in the shopping mall there. We felt safer.