On 17 May 1990 the Afremov family entered Israel in Ben Gurion International Airport. They had to give up their Soviet citizenship in favor of Israeli. To this day, Leonid Afremov and his family are citizens of Israel only. The Afremovs had some family in Israel who had lived there since the 1970s and 1980s. Said family rented an apartment for them in Ramat-Gan and helped them to start their new life in Israel. A few weeks after moving to Israel, Leonid Afremov found a job in an advertisement agency making signs and posters. After working in an advertisement agency, he worked in a gallery shop where he learned to make frames, being introduced to the palette knife for the first time.