This autumn, Plan B Foundation will inaugurate its new headquarters in Cluj, located in Bogdánffy House, transforming a centuries-old historic monument into a space dedicated to contemporary art, research, and public engagement.
The opening marks a new chapter for the Plan B Foundation, an organization founded two decades ago by Mihai Pop and Adrian Ghenie, which has consistently contributed to the development of Romania’s art scene through exhibitions, publications, restoration projects, and international collaborations. The new space in Cluj aims to address a longstanding need within the local art scene: the existence of an infrastructure capable of supporting, over the long term, not only exhibition-making but also artistic research, production, and critical reflection.
The institutional model proposed by the Foundation lies somewhere between the responsibilities of a museum and the flexibility of a kunsthalle-type structure. On the one hand, the Foundation is developing its own collection and collaborating with public and private collections, bringing lesser-known works and artistic practices to wider attention. On the other hand, it supports the production of new projects, providing Romanian and international artists with contexts for research, experimentation, and dialogue with the public.
“Twenty years after the opening of Plan B Gallery, the Foundation’s Berlin sister space, we are inaugurating our new space in Cluj this September,” says Mihai Pop, co-founder and executive director of the Foundation. For him, the new headquarters is a place where the city’s complex history can be viewed through the lens of artists and themes that go beyond the logic of the market and invite long-term reflection. At the same time, the project continues the values that have defined the Plan B community over the past two decades: empathy, friendship, and a deep appreciation for art.
Bogdánffy House, built in the early 19th century, incorporates the Shoemakers’ Tower into its structure, a part of Cluj’s second fortified enclosure, erected in the 16th century. The consolidation and conversion project, carried out by Attila Kim Architects, preserves these historical layers as visible elements, without turning them into a mere decorative backdrop for contemporary art.
The architectural interventions have been conceived as reversible insertions, engaging in dialogue with the existing structure and with the successive functions the building has served over time. The restored complex includes exhibition spaces, areas for research and public programs, a library, a café, and a sculpture garden.
The first project presented in the new space is the exhibition “Inauguration,” curated by Mihnea Mircan. Open to the public from September 18 to November 22, 2026, the exhibition takes the very idea of a beginning as its point of departure: works that symbolically or physically activate different parts and layers of the building, as well as works that themselves mark the emergence of a language, a metaphorical relationship, or a new scenario. The exhibition thus offers a first reading of the space, in which architecture and artworks encounter and reactivate one another.
The exhibition features Radu Abraham, Ioana Bătrânu, Alex Bodea, Erik Bünger, Jonathan van Doornum, Adrian Ganea, Fabien Giraud & Raphaël Siboni, IRWIN, Sanja Iveković, Jill Magid, Piero Manzoni, Fabio Mauri, Philip Metten, Jean-Luc Moulène, Ciprian Mureșan, Navid Nuur, Miklós Onucsán, Șerban Savu, Larisa Sitar, Lucy Skaer, and Mona Vătămanu & Florin Tudor. The program is complemented by a video selection featuring works by Noor Abed, Simon Dybbroe Møller, Daphné Heretakis, Sasha Litvintseva & Beny Wagner, Jean-Daniel Pollet, Mary Reid Kelley & Patrick Kelley, and Ben Rivers.
The inaugural weekend takes place from September 18 to 20, 2026, daily from 4:00 PM to 9:00 PM at Avram Iancu 1, 400089 Cluj, Romania.
The Foundation’s new program will continue in December 2026 with the exhibition “Horia Bernea: The Radical Embrace of Seeing,” curated by Magda Radu and Ștefan Sava, in partnership with the Horia Bernea Foundation. In April 2027, solo exhibitions by artists Danae Io, Camille Blatrix, and Dan Beudean are scheduled to open.
Main sponsor: Banca Transilvania
Cover photo credit: George Negrea
