Born in Jerusalem in 1977 and living in Milan, Yuval Avital is considered as one of the most prominent multimedia artists of Italy. Both a poliedric artist working with numerous mediums (paintings, photography, sculptures, sound installations, video art, performance) as a musical composer, Avital develops his works in a variety of spaces, including public venues, industrial archaeological sites, theatres and museums, challenging the traditional crystallized categories that separate the arts.

In his exhibitions, art events, immersive installations, total-operas, large-scale musical ‘rituals’, and concerts one can find dancers, contemporary music ensembles, masters of ancient cultures, recruited individuals or communities, multi-video projections, meditative tactile ambients, advanced technological instruments, archive materials, scientific data, sound-sculptures, large scale site specific murals and art films.

Avital’s artworks have been presented in museums, art foundations, venues and art events such as MANIFESTA Biennial, Gwangju Biennale, Ostrale Dresden Biennale, Florence Biennale, Biennale Le Latitudini dell’Arte (Genoa/Gothenburg), Baths of Caracalla Rome, LOOP Festival - Barcelona, Palais de Tokyo, One World Trade Center New York, MACRO Museum of Contemporary Art Rome, GAM Gallery of Modern Art  - Turin, La Fabbrica de Cioccolato Foundation - Switzerland, Saint Antoine Church - Istanbul, Marino Marini Museum - Florence; National Science and Technology Museum “Leonardo da Vinci” - Milan.

In addition he had presented two solo exhibitions in galleries: ETERE (2021) at Building - Milan and Song of the Chimeras at Gowen Contemporary - Geneva.

His compositions and stage works were presented opera houses, venues and festivals such as  Parma Opera House Teatro Regio, TeatroDue Parma, Modena Freni-Pavarotti Opera House, Teatro Valli Reggio Emilia, Teatro Comunale di Como, Musiktheater im Revier Gelsenkirchen, Centre Pompidou Paris, National Conservatory of China, Tel Aviv Museum, Palazzo Reale Milan, Warsaw Autumn Festival, London Design Festival, Brighton Festival, MiTo SettembreMusica Festival, Palazzo Reale Milan, RomaEuropa Festival, Matera European Capital of Culture.

In 2022 Avital was nominated as ‘artist-of-the-year’ by Reggio-Parma Festival (Italy’s biggest festival), creating a huge meta-opera titled ‘Bestiario della Terra’ (=‘Bestiary of the Earth’), composed of 4 large scale monographic exhibitions, installations and total take overs of the two cities main theatres and Opera houses.
 
 
Avital created Italy’s biggest sound sculpture -  OPEN FENCE - a massive Sound- Sculpture of 320 tubular bells, 64 meters long and 4 meters high, playable by 80 visitors simultaneously (East End Studios, Milan).  
He is also the author of the largest sound installation in Italian history - ALMA MATER -, covering an area of 1200 sqm with a “forest” of 140 loudspeakers, projections and light (Fabbrica del Vapore, Milan 2015).

His sound and visual artwork is HUMAN SIGNS, a Global participatory online dance and voice artwork, conceived in time of COVID-19 from March 2020 (ongoing), with the participation of over 200 artists from over 50 countries presented digitally in MANIFESTA 13 Marseille as a part of Real Utopias exhibition; presented also as a large scale physical exhibition at LOOP Festival: City Screen 2021 in Barcelona.


Chosen performed / exhibited works
(2023-2010)

 
Foreign Bodies - collective show, curator Valentina Buzzi
 
Gwangju Biennale, Italian pavilion, Republic of Korea
 
5 parallel projections, loudspeakers and murals.
 
April 23 -July 9, 2023

LESSICO ANIMALE. MYSTERION - solo exhibition, curator Cristiano Leone
 
Terme di Caracalla, Rome, Italy
 
2000 square meters exhibition composed of photographies, icon-sonic artworks, sound sculptures. 125x2,5 meters-long painting on wood; Opening with two days of live performances.
 
February 25 - April 23, 2023

MOSTRARIO - Il Bestiario della Terra
 
Teatro Regio Parma, Teatro Due Parma, Teatro Valli, Reggio Emila, Italy.
 
Sound Art, Video Art, Dance, Performance, Paintings, Sculpture, Score, Theatrical staging, Site- specific installations.
 
November 18 - December, 2022

MEMBRANE - Il Bestiario della Terra solo exhibition, curator Marina Dacci
 
Chiostri di San Pietro, Reggio Emilia, Italy
 
156 artworks between paintings, drawings, sound sculptures and photographs.
 
October 1 - November 13, 2022

PERSONA - Il Bestiario della Terra solo exhibition, curator Chiara Canali
 
Palazzo Marchi, Parma, Italy
 
Exhibition created in dialogue with the halls and the collections of Palazzo Marchi, including sound sculptures, installations and video art.
 
September 10 - October 30, 2022

LESSICO ANIMALE. PROLOGO - Il Bestiario della Terra solo exhibition, curator Cristiano Leone
 
APE Museo, Parma, Italy
 
Photography, video art, sound sculptures, installations.  
 
July 7 - October 16, 2022

ANATOMIE SQUISITE - Il Bestiario della Terra solo exhibition, curator Alessandro Gazzotti
 
Musei Civici Reggio Emilia, Italy
 
An artist installation created in dialogue with the Spallanzani Collection of the Civic Museums of Reggio Emilia. Sound art, paintings, sculptures and relational artworks created in collaboration with different artistic and craft realities of the city.
 
June 8 - November 27, 2022

SONG OF THE CHIMERAS - solo exhibition
 
Gowen Contemporary, Geneva, Switzerland
 
46 artworks; paintings, photography, video artworks and sound sculptures.
 
24 February 2022- 23 April, 2022

DETOUR 2.0: A JOURNEY THROUGH CREATIVE CATALYSTS - collective exhibition
 
Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France
 
Organised by Moleskine Foundation, art notebook “What Comes First”, (2021)
 
9 - 20 February, 2022

HUMAN_SIGNS_LOOP/ED - solo exhibition, curated by Savina Tarsitano
 
Espronceda Institute of Art and Culture, Barcelona, Spain, LOOP Festival
 
An immersive polyptych installation of 7 parallel projections, loudspeakers, Domestic Grids, chalk drawings and an experience room.
 
13 - 22 November, 2021

MIKVÉ (Holy Bath) - site specific installation
Milan Design and Art Week and Miart,
 
Bagni Misteriosi - Parenti Art & Design District, Milan, Italy
 
15 sound sculptures in a site specific
 
4 - 19 September, 2021

E T E R E - solo exhibition, curated by Annette Hofmann
 
BUILDING, Milan, Italy
 
120 artworks, from paintings, photography, video artworks and sound sculptures.
 
8 April - 26 June, 2021

OPENING PERFORMANCE WITH FOREIGN BODIES ACTION - performance
 
Woolbridge Gallery, Biella, Italy
 
Opening performance of Woolbridge Gallery with Accademia alla Scala dancers.
3 October, 2020

MEDITATIONS ON THEATRUM MUNDI - electro-acoustic composition
 
LONDON DESIGN FESTIVAL, MSCTY EXPO, 2020
 
“Meditations on ‘Theatrum Mundi’” is a sonic response in 12 movements by Yuval Avital to Daniel Libeskind’s “Theatrum Mundi”, 1983, a series of 12 abstract works.
 
12 - 20 September, 2020

HUMAN SIGNS - Global Multimedia Participatory artwork of voice and gesture
 
Online; MANIFESTA 13 Biennial, Real Utopias exhibition Marseille
 
Over 200 artists from over 50 countries, international multidisciplinary team, presented online through audiovisual ensembles on different formats and platforms.
 
March, 2020 - Ongoing

ANGELS collective exhibition, curator Ayşe Pınar Akalın
 
Saint Antoine Church, Istanbul, Turkey
 
Sound Sculpture, 2 large-scale prints, 20 paintings.
 
17 December, 2019 - 30 January, 2020

FUGA PERPETUA - Icon-Sonic Opera
 
Teatro Comunale “L. Pavarotti” Modena, Italy; Brighton Festival, UK; Tel Aviv Museum, Israel; Musiktheater
im Revier, Gelsenkirchen, Germany; Ethos Melos International Festival of Contemporary Music, Slovakia
 
For an ensemble, visuals, mobile sound theater and a vocal crowd Performing: Meitar Ensemble. With the sponsorship of UNHCR.

  
(2016 - 2019)

 
ICON-SONIC POSTCARDS N.2, POSTCARDS FROM ROME - art-show, various curators
 
MACRO Museum of Contemporary Art Rome, Italy
 
Filming set, megaphone choirs, itinerary loudspeaker, flash mobs, light-boxes , audio, video and paper documents, Icon-sonic installation (final step).
 
1 December, 2018 - 1 December, 2019

NEPHILIM - solo exhibition
 
Marino Marini Museum, Florence, Italy
 
Solo exhibition of 60 sound masks sculptures created in dialogue with 24 master artisans
 
3 October, 2019 - 31 December, 2019

#URLA Massive Sonic Work / meta-parade
 
Open Sound Festival, official main event of Matera 2019, European Capital of Culture, Italy.
 
Massive Sonic Work n.6 for 300 performers, itinerary geographical score for the entire city center.
 
1 September, 2019

THE RATTLES GARDEN - permanent sound sculpture
 
Mulinum San Floro, Calabria, Italy
 
Permanent 1500 square meters of a Participative Sound Sculpture composed of 50 iron sculptures and 180 bells of the Mediterranean.
 
Inauguration 14 July, 2019

OPENING AND MAIN EVENT OF OSTRALE BIENNALE
 
Ostrale Art Biennale, Dresden, Germany
 
2 large-scale installations, a photographic section, live performance opening event of the Biennial.
 
3 July - 1 September, 2019

ALMA MATER - Icon-Sonic installation
 
Cattedrale of Fabbrica del Vapore, Milan, Italy
 
For a forest of 140 loudspeakers, legendary etoile of Teatro Alla Scala e lacemakers, in dialogue with Il Terzo Paradiso by Michelangelo Pistoletto.
 
July - August, 2015

REKA - Massive Sonic Work
 
MiTo SettembreMusica, Milan, Italy and Warsaw Autumn Festival, Poland, Vali Theater Reggio Emilia
 
For six traditional singers, two percussions and a crowd of hundreds of voices. Commissioned by Warsaw Autumn Festival.
 
2014 - 2016

KARAGATAN - Massive Sonic Work
 
Closing event of Tunog- Tugan 1st International Gong & Bamboo Festival, Dipolog city, Philippines
 
For 100 traditional performers of gong & metal percussions from 10 countries of South East Asia.
 
February, 2013

OTOT  symphonic, video & live electronics
 
Teatro Sociale di Como, Italy
 
For chamber orchestra, 5 percussions, 3 accordions, video & live electronics.
 
January, 2013

UNFOLDING SPACE Chamber music, video & electronics
 
BergamoScienza Festival, Italy
 
Concerto for electric guitar, live electronics, video and sonic translations of the cosmic space. In collaboration with NASA & ESA scientists.
 
October, 2012

GARON Massive Sonic Work
 
Anish Kapoor’s Dirty Corner closing event at La Fabbrica del Vapore, Milan, Italy
 
For 45 tubas, 6 percussions, choir, vocal soloists & live electronics.
 
January, 2012

MISE EN ABÎME - Massive Sonic Work
 
Premiere RAI studios, Milan, Italy
 
For a crowd of 100 persons, 34 accordions, soloists & 4 conductors.
 
February, 2011

SAMARITANS - Icon-Sonic opera n.2
 
MiTo SettembreMusica Festival, Teatro Nuovo, Milan, Italy
 
For a Samaritan vocal choir, ensemble, video, electronics, stage design.
 
September, 2010