Belu-Simion Fainaru. The House from Cămărzana – Place of Absence
The Cluj-Napoca Museum of Art, a cultural institution operating under the authority of the Cluj County Council, presents The House from Cămărzana – Place of Absence, an exhibition by Belu-Simion Fainaru, on view from 9 to 27 September 2026. The exhibition will open on Wednesday, 9 September 2026, at 6:00 PM.
The House from Cămărzana – Place of Absence forms part of Belu-Simion Fainaru’s longstanding engagement with memory, identity, belonging and absence. The title of the project refers to a house in Cămărzana, Satu Mare County, and opens up a reflection on the house not simply as a physical place of dwelling, but as a site of memory bearing the traces of those who are no longer present. At the heart of the project is the history of a Jewish house in Cămărzana and the process of its relocation to Cluj-Napoca. Home to a Jewish family until their deportation during the Holocaust, the house remained on its original site for decades. Its transfer to a new context, however, goes beyond the preservation of a building, raising questions about the relationship between place and belonging, matter and memory, presence and absence. Beyond its particular history, the house evokes broader experiences of displacement and loss, as well as the fragility of the very idea of “home”. These concerns are central to Belu-Simion Fainaru’s artistic practice, in which everyday objects, materials and space become means of exploring memory and absence. Rather than attempting to reconstruct the past, his works create situations in which meaning emerges through the encounter between viewer, object and space. Presence and absence, the familiar and the uncanny, what can be recovered and what remains inaccessible coexist within an artistic language in which the viewer’s experience plays an essential role.
For this exhibition, Belu-Simion Fainaru has invited artists Avital Bar-Shay and Or Fainaru, whose works introduce complementary perspectives on the body, vulnerability and violence. In The Boxers, Avital Bar-Shay uses stitching to create images of female bodies engaged in the characteristic movements of boxing. Working with black thread on white lace, the artist brings strength and fragility, wounding and repair, confrontation and resilience into tension. In the video work Savage State, Or Fainaru explores the relationship between individual and collective violence and the ways in which images of war and aggression permeate everyday experience.
Belu-Simion Fainaru (b. 1959, Romania) lives and works in Haifa and Antwerp. He studied art and philosophy at the University of Haifa and received a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Chicago, subsequently continuing his studies at Domus Academy in Milan and the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Brussels. He is currently Professor of Art at the University of Haifa.
His artistic practice encompasses installation, sculpture, drawing, object-based work and video, exploring themes such as memory, identity, absence, nomadism and the relationship between the individual, place and community. Over the course of his career, his work has been presented in major international contexts, including documenta 9, Kassel (1992), the Venice Biennale (1993), Sonsbeek and the Havana Biennial. In 2019, he was one of three artists representing Romania at the 58th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, as part of Unfinished Conversations on the Weight of Absence, curated by Cristian Nae.
In 2025, Belu-Simion Fainaru was awarded the Israel Prize for Design and Interdisciplinary Art, Israel’s most prestigious distinction in the fields of science and the arts. He is currently representing Israel at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia with the solo exhibition Rose of Nothingness.
Belu-Simion Fainaru’s solo exhibitions have been presented at institutions including the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, S.M.A.K. in Ghent, M HKA in Antwerp, the Lehmbruck Museum and the Saitama Museum. He is also the founder and artistic director of the Mediterranean Biennale, an international project dedicated to fostering intercultural dialogue through art.
