Israel may not have a Picasso or a Rembrandt, but it does boast the highest percentage of high schools in the world that have dance as part of the regular curriculum, notes Yekutieli.

Going Gaga at the museum

Dance, art and music will all be celebrated at Art Year. The March 21-24 Art Weekend kickoff event is planned to generate excitement with open galleries and art marathons throughout the conjoined seaside cities of Tel Aviv and Jaffa.

A 24-hour art gallery opening at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art will offer curator talks, art classes, tours and even dance, when Gaga — a free-movement dance therapy approach conceived by Ohad Naharin from Batsheva — will perform at the museum.

The otherwise conservative museum will be opening an entire wall as a blank canvas, as it were, for unknown or aspiring Israeli artists. Any young artist can submit work anonymously to be considered by a committee of locals and outsiders who will curate the show.

“This act might seem minor,” Yekutieli says, “but once you start thinking about it, is very important. Anybody can apply, and nobody will know your name. You will be judged just on the art itself. It will be displayed for 24 hours only, but it will be a way for new artists to be discovered.”

Yekutieli says there will be a conference on art and business, which will give artists useful information about making art a career that can also pay the bills.

White Night