Elias Nafaa is an  artist, architect, and researcher working between Montréal and Beirut. Through sculpture, moving-image essays, and archival interventions, he examines how infrastructures of protection can mirror the very violence they claim to avert. Navigating the fragile line where acts of care tip into coercion, Nafaa translates states of emergency into charged material and narrative forms.

A graduate of Ashkal Alwan’s Home Workspace Program, he is part of the Public Programs team at the Canadian Centre for Architecture and a 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale Fellow (Canada Council for the Arts). His work has been presented at Galerie Tanit (Beirut) and the Institut du monde arabe (Paris), with a forthcoming presentation at Manif d’art, Québec Biennale (Québec City). It is held in the collections of the Institut du monde arabe (Donation Claude & France Lemand), the Dalloul Art Foundation, and the Beirut Museum of Art.





Handle with Care / À manipuler avec soin
Solo exhibition
La Chambre blanche, Québec City, Canada
2026

Photo Credit: Ivan Binet
Photo Credit: Pedro Barbáchano
Photo Credit: Pedro Barbáchano
Photo Credit: Pedro Barbáchano
Photo Credit: Pedro Barbáchano
Photo Credit: Pedro Barbáchano
Manif d’art 12, Québec City Biennial (Splitting Ice / Briser la glace) 

300 cast resin forms organized into six munition families
Variable dimensions

Sound composition:
Cynthia Zaven

More information: Manif d’art 12

February 28 to April 19, 2026 

Produced with the support of the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec.

Thank you to the production and realization team: Jiwan Larouche, Tania Bonardo-Pellerin, Judith Ricard, Lucille Ganne, Kristel Tremblay, Olivier Borzeix, Carl-Dave Lagotte, and Studio Fig; to Didier Morelli; and to the Manif d’art team: Méliane Quessy, Julia Caron Guillemette, Émile Meyssat, Claude Bélanger, Marie-Christine Landry, and Michel Bélanger.


© 2026 Elias Nafaa Montréal / Beirut