Rupture Into Light

A Solo Exhibition by Marwan Sahmarani

Rupture Into Light, now open to the public at The Farjam Foundation, brings together a selection of major paintings and studies by Lebanese artist Marwan Sahmarani, offering a powerful meditation on rupture, memory, and the fragile processes of renewal. Drawn from The Farjam Collection and thoughtfully shaped through the curatorial vision and editorial work behind the exhibition catalog, the presentation reveals the depth and clarity of the artist’s practice while situating it within a broader cultural and historical dialogue.

Sahmarani’s canvases unfold through dense impasto, urgent gestures, and charged chromatic contrasts that embody the turbulence of lived experience. His work does not merely depict conflict; it performs it, inviting viewers into a space where personal history, collective trauma, and metaphysical searching intersect. A central work, Collision I, bears the physical scars of the 2020 Beirut Port explosion—a tear sutured by the artist and left intentionally visible. This decisive gesture transforms the painting into both witness and survivor, a reminder that repair can be an act of truth rather than concealment.

Across the exhibition, themes of transformation, dissolution, and re-emergence course through the monumental triptychs and quadriptychs, each painting echoing the artist’s lifelong engagement with the complexities of Lebanon and the wider region. The studies, shown publicly for the first time, illuminate the clarity and intensity of Sahmarani’s process before the full force of paint overtakes the surface.

The accompanying exhibition catalog, edited and shaped with curatorial insight by Roxane Zand, provides a deeper lens into the artist’s world—tracing his influences, his artistic lineage, and the conceptual ground from which these works emerge. Her framing enriches the exhibition, offering readers a broader context for understanding the painterly, emotional, and philosophical registers that define Sahmarani’s oeuvre.

Through this focused and resonant presentation, The Farjam Foundation invites audiences to engage with one of Lebanon’s most compelling contemporary voices. The exhibition reflects the Foundation’s commitment to fostering meaningful cultural dialogue, presenting art that confronts the complexities of human experience while illuminating the moments of clarity that arise from rupture itself.