Touring Brutalist Tel-Aviv: ‘Atarim’ square and Tel-Aviv’s shoreline.

ReCA invites you to explore brutalist buildings in Tel-aviv in three guided virtual tours.
The nascence of the state of Israel in 1948 coincides with the Late-Modernism and Brutalism in Architecture. Most of the public structures built during the 1950s and 1960s manifest brutalist Architecture as a promoter of democracy, modesty, pluralism, and integrity, both in material and in form. ReCA’s team, led by founder Arch. Amnon Rechter and Curator Arch. Dana Gordon will conduct three virtual guided tours in which we will explore the term ‘power’ and its relation to Architecture, Urbanism, and ‘The State’. We will examine three iconic buildings planned by Rechter Architects in Tel-Aviv and their adjacent urban context.

'Atarim Square' is a space that is neither a city nor a beach. The square is an intermediate space, an important urban joint that serves both as a balcony overlooking the sea and as an open urban piazza that allows one to wander from the crowded city to the Mediterranean and back. The story of the square is on the one hand a story of bold architecture that advanced its time and on the other, a story of a society undergoing a dramatic change from a socialist society to a capitalist consumer society. The central building, which has turned into a strip club after opening as a drugstore, functions currently as a center for culture, art, and society. Through the fascinating history of this central place in Tel Aviv, it is possible to reveal how in the shadow of original and challenging architectural design, economics, politics, entrepreneurship, gender exploitation, and overpriced flip flops co-exist.