Fragments of Light: Honouring the Life and Art of Aida Rubeiz
Some mornings begin with silence that feels different. Heavier. This morning at Kulturnest was one of those. Before the doors opened, before the lights were switched on and the kettle boiled, the news reached us: Aida Rubeiz has left us. It is difficult to write those words. Aida was not only an artist we worked with; she was part of the earliest heartbeat of our space.
When Kulturnest first opened its doors in 2023, nothing was certain. The walls were fresh, the concept still fragile, halfway between a dream and a project. Aida was one of the very first artists to say “yes”. She stepped into this in-between space with a quiet confidence, bringing with her a universe of paper, colour, and tiny fragments of memory. Her collage and miniature mixed-media works quickly found a place on our walls, but more importantly, in the hearts of those who visited. Many of her pieces left with people who recognised something of themselves in her art: a tenderness, a sense of nostalgia, a fragile strength that does not shout but insists gently on being seen.
Aida’s story is one of a keen eye for beauty. She noticed things others might have overlooked: flowers past their prime, bits of printed paper, forgotten objects, textures of wood, porcelain, or cardboard. Where some saw waste, she saw potential. Without any formal academic training in the arts, she had an instinctive understanding of composition and balance. She knew how to rearrange and repurpose materials into eclectic, unique creations that felt at once intimate and universal.
One of the stories that stayed with us is from her early twenties. Aida had an antique wooden wardrobe cut and completely transformed into a formal sitting room unlike any other. That radical gesture says a lot about her way of inhabiting the world: she was never afraid to reconfigure, to reimagine, to give existing things a new function and a new soul. From furniture to gardens, she built, step by step, a language of her own—made of spaces, objects, and atmospheres.
As life carried her to different countries and continents, far from her family, friends, and familiar landscapes, collage became her refuge and her language. It allowed her to gather feelings, memories, and dreams into a small, portable universe where everything could coexist: past and present, here and elsewhere, absence and presence. Her tools were simple - paper and glue - but her supports were endlessly varied: canvas, cardboard, porcelain, glass, wood, or any object carrying what she called a “silent meaning”. She loved using printed material, often fragments of someone else’s art, and giving these clippings a new life in a new narrative. Frequently, one single image became the seed of a whole work: from that small starting point, scene and story would unfold, clipping after clipping, until colours, figures, objects, and memories merged into a living collage.
Among her works, one piece in particular feels important to remember now: “Respite.” Aida described it with a clarity that still resonates. She would say that she did not see sadness in blacks and greys. For her, black, grey, and white were not depressing—they were neutral, calming, even comforting. These were, in her words, the colours of a quiet office, of a space where the mind can rest.
She created Respite shortly after returning to Lebanon, after what seemed to her like a lifetime of living abroad. The collage is more than an artwork; it is a visual diary of that moment of return. It gathers a collection of memories, impressions, and tensions: the gap between the Lebanon she had left so long ago and the Lebanon she found upon her return. In the work, you can sense the loss of those who were no longer there, the distance between people who are physically present but emotionally far, the difficulty of re-entering a culture that has changed—and that you, too, have outgrown or approached differently.
Aida spoke of the longing to gather with distant friends who now live scattered around the world. She evoked the cultural “cuffs” that make it hard to form new relationships or to reconnect with old ones. She mentioned the small, flickering glow of a burning fire: its warmth becoming a temporary refuge, a place where, for a moment, the scattered pieces of one’s life can seem to belong together. For her, Respite was directly linked to fortitude: the strength of the human spirit as it resets, reconfigures, adapts, and learns to accept new norms and new adversities. The piece is not about resignation; it is about the quiet courage of continuing.
What made Aida’s presence at Kulturnest so special was not only her art, but who she was as a person. She was deeply appreciated by those who met her: gentle, attentive, curious, and warm. She took a genuine interest in others’ work, and spoke of art with humility rather than ego. She did not simply use Kulturnest as a display space - she inhabited it, as if it were another of her collages, full of small human details worth noticing.
There is another detail that we hold close: Aida was the very first customer of our concept store. Long before our shelves were as full and curated as they are today, she walked in and chose pieces made by other artists to offer as gifts to her family. In a world where competition is often taken for granted, this gesture of supporting fellow creatives speaks volumes. It tells us who she was: someone who believed in community, who took joy in lifting others, who saw value in the presence and work of those around her.
Today, as we write these lines, her artworks come to mind like fragments of a conversation that continues. Each collage holds something of her way of seeing the world: attentive to small things, sensitive to the invisible, always willing to give second chances - to images, objects, and perhaps, symbolically, to life itself. Her pieces invite us to slow down, to look closer, to recognise that meaning is often built from the leftover scraps of experience.
We will remember Aida Rubeiz as an artist of subtle poetry and as a woman of rare grace. In our memory, she will remain standing quietly in the gallery space, observing the visitors discover her work or sitting with us, speaking softly about colours, paper, and the places she has carried in her heart. Her passing leaves an emptiness, but also a responsibility: to honour that same spirit of generosity, resilience, and attention to beauty in our own work and in the way we hold this community.
Our thoughts, love, and solidarity go out to her family and loved ones. May they find comfort in knowing how deeply she was appreciated here - not only for what she created, but for who she was.
You will be deeply missed, dear Aida. May you rest in peace, surrounded by the colours and quiet lights you loved so much.