UTS Gallery & Art Collection

UTS Gallery & Art Collection UTS Gallery is a space where creativity and technology meet, focused on diverse, innovative and cros

17/06/2026

Published on the occasion of Spence Messih's exhibition A river runs through, "Rival: Stories of water and gender" brings together perspectives on water and gender from the fields of political ecology and trans studies. Rather than documenting the exhibition, Rival opens a wider field of reflection, attending to what Messih describes as "the excess" of water and gender. Foregrounded by the shared pressures and porosities that shape both bodies and environments, contributing writers Astrid Lorange and Andrew Brooks, Amelia Groom, Arlie Alizzi, and Hil Malatino explore questions of embodiment, extraction, labour, legibility, kinship, and contamination.

The book moves through writings by invited contributors and includes one-colour reproductions of Messih’s photogravure print Hiddener abode I–VII (2025). The debossed outline on the cover recalls the shape of the feral goat hides Messih uses in his body of work, alluding to the figure of the scapegoat.

Rival is available to purchase in the gallery or online. A percentage of sale proceeds support the Murray Lower Darling Rivers Indigenous Nations, the Bob Brown Foundation, and Headspace Broken Hill.

64 pages, 107 x 175mm
Debossed and foil stamped cover
1-spot colour internal pages
Perfect bound
Design: Zenobia Ahmed
Print: Gunn & Taylor
Published by: UTS Gallery & Art Collection, Gadigal Nura/Sydney
Authors: Spence Messih, Stella Rosa McDonald, Alie Alizzi, Andrew Brooks & Astrid Lorange, HIl Malatino and Amelia Groom
Commissioning editors: Stella Rosa McDonald, Spence Messih
Animation: Finn Marchant



[ID: a fast-paced looping animated 'flip-through' for a recently published book. Moving from a bright orange cover through still images of the internal pages with images and texts in bright blue, and finishing with the back cover which has the title and authors printed on orange paper in shiny blue foil.]

—

Connie Anthes

Assistant Curator

, UTS Gallery & Art Collection

* Please note, I work Mondays and Wednesdays in a jobshare role with Alice Rezende *

UTS Gallery & Art Collection
Marketing and Communications Un

'A river runs through' presents a new body of work by Spence Messih that considers how both water and gender are monitor...
15/06/2026

'A river runs through' presents a new body of work by Spence Messih that considers how both water and gender are monitored, categorised and disciplined. Moving between sculpture, print and film, Messih develops a material language shaped by tension, movement and contradiction.

Over the past decade, Messih has worked across sculpture, installation, and text to create works that move between abstraction and figuration. Attuned to the nuances of materiality and transformation, his practice combines intuitive and idiosyncratic processes that challenge notions of truth and reveal the contradictions and mutability of both materials and ideas. 'A river runs through' continues at UTS Gallery until 28 August.

Visit the gallery Monday to Friday, between 11am and 4pm.

Supported by Creative Australia and the Canberra Glassworks Artist in Residence Program.



[ID: a carousel of sculptural and textural details in warm tones set against a concrete-floored gallery, featuring close-ups of timber marquetry, kiln-formed glass in curved 'pipe' shapes, and a large felted goat textile.]

Select UTS Gallery titles are now available to purchase via (Naarm/Melbourne) as well as when you visit UTS Gallery.Wor...
20/05/2026

Select UTS Gallery titles are now available to purchase via (Naarm/Melbourne) as well as when you visit UTS Gallery.

World Food Books is devoted to the presentation of a rotating, hand-selection of international art, design, literary and counterculture publications with an emphasis on the anti-traditional, the experimental, and the avant-garde.



[ID: a carousel of images of UTS Gallery publications laid flat on a polished concrete floor.]

Join us at UTS Gallery from 6pm tomorrow, Thursday 7 May, to celebrate the opening of Spence Messih’s ‘A river runs thro...
06/05/2026

Join us at UTS Gallery from 6pm tomorrow, Thursday 7 May, to celebrate the opening of Spence Messih’s ‘A river runs through’.

Across sculpture, print and film, Messih presents a significant new body of work that traces the intertwined currents of water and gender, and the fragility of the systems, or fantasies, constructed to control them.

“Borders of race, gender and power are born of the same extractive forces that shape ecologies. In moments of converging ecological, social and economic crises, who benefits? Who becomes a scapegoat?”
– Spence Messih

RSVP at link in bio.

Commissioned by UTS Gallery & Art Collection. This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body, and the Canberra Glassworks Artist in Residence Program.

–
Images:
1. Spence Messih stands next to ‘A river run through’ artworks. Background: ‘Hiddener abode I–VII’ [installation view detail] 2025. Foreground: ‘False antithesis I–V’ [installation view detail], 2026. UTS Gallery, Gadigal Nura/Sydney. Courtesy the artist. Photo: Jacquie Manning.
2 and 3. ‘False antithesis I–V’ [installation view details], 2026, UTS Gallery, Gadigal Nura/Sydney. Courtesy the artist. Photos: Jacquie Manning.

OPENING SOON–“I’m interested in how both gender and water are disciplined, contained and extracted and how both reveal t...
28/04/2026

OPENING SOON–

“I’m interested in how both gender and water are disciplined, contained and extracted and how both reveal the fragility of the systems, or fantasies, constructed to control them. This is not an argument for a neat analogy between gender and water, but an invitation to stay with their struggles, shared unruliness and resistance to being fixed or fully known.”
– Spence Messih

‘A river runs through’ presents a significant new body of work by Spence Messih that traces the intertwined currents of water and gender.

Join us for opening night on Thursday, 7 May, 6–7.30pm with a Welcome to Country by Authy Rhonda Dixon Grovenor.

RSVP at link in bio.

Commissioned by UTS Gallery & Art Collection. This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body, and the Canberra Glassworks Artist in Residence Program.
australia

FINAL WEEK'No place for mannequins: Remaking the fashion archive' examines the shifting form and status of the fashion a...
20/04/2026

FINAL WEEK
'No place for mannequins: Remaking the fashion archive' examines the shifting form and status of the fashion archive as a site of authority—shaping narratives of dress, design, and consumption. Through storytelling, ethical inquiry, and experimental practice, the exhibition considers how fashion histories are made and remade. On view until Friday 24 April.

Images: 'No place for mannequins', UTS Gallery (installation views), 2026. Photos: Jacquie Manning. See individual captions in comments.



[ID: A carousel of images featuring an exhibition with displays from key vantage points within the gallery. The works in the exhibition are placed in context: deconstructed clothing, textile installations, custom wallpapers, poetry, low relief sculptures, printmaking and films.]

17/04/2026

intergenerational knowledge, garment-making, family, material embodiment, memory, land, beadwork

Artist Justine Woods reflects on intergenerational knowledge, material memory, and land-based storytelling through her Mackinaw jacket, featured in ‘No place for mannequins,’ now showing at UTS Gallery until 24 April 2026. Drawing on familial histories and the legacy of garment-making, Woods transforms the iconic Canadian jacket into a living archive – beaded with excerpts from her late grandmother Mary Woods’ 1979 journal, and shaped by a return to Moon River alongside her father. The work honours both personal lineage and the Wisaakodewikweg who first crafted the Mackinaw jacket in the ealry 19th century, weaving together memory, place, and cultural continuity through intricate beadwork and material embodiment.



Videography: Jason Benedek and Michael Weatherill
Voiceover: Justine Woods

14/04/2026

UPCOMING:
‘A river runs through’
Spence Messih
5 May – 21 August 2026

‘A river runs through’ presents a major new body of work by Spence Messih that considers how both water and gender are monitored, categorised and disciplined. Moving between sculpture, print and film, Messih develops a material language shaped by tension, movement and contradiction.

Over the past decade, Messih has worked across sculpture, installation, and text to create works that move between abstraction and figuration. Attuned to the nuances of materiality and transformation, Messih’s practice combines intuitive and idiosyncratic processes that challenge notions of truth and reveal the contradictions and mutability of both materials and ideas. His latest works at UTS Gallery continue to deepen this rich material language.

Join us to celebrate the opening of ‘A river runs through’ on Thursday 7 May, 6–7.30 pm, with a Welcome to Country by Aunty Rhonda Dixon Grovenor.

Commissioned by UTS Gallery & Art Collection. This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body, and the Canberra Glassworks Artist in Residence Program.



[ID: White text on a heavy blue background, with an exhibition title, artist name and dates surrounding a rectangular field of grainy film footage in high contrast, which loops rhythmically.]

09/04/2026

‘bodies, things, sensations, correlations, wear, time, holes, destruction, preservation, transformation’

Artist and exhibition curator Todd Robinson describes influences and relational elements of his archival practice when discussing his works ‘Holey singlet’ (2025) and ‘Helmut Lang parachute jacket with bo***ge straps Automne/Hiver 1998/1999’ (2026), both featured in ‘No place for mannequins,’ now showing at UTS Gallery until 24 April 2026. Drawn to the multiple connections between his wardrobe and personal and familial stories, Robinson playfully elevates these garments into gleaming objets d’art cast in white-patinated bronze and aluminium.



Videography: Jason Benedek Jason Benedek
Voiceover: Todd Robinson Todd Robinson

Call for Papers: Opening Up the Fashion ArchiveWhat does it mean to open the fashion archive today—and who gets to shape...
23/12/2025

Call for Papers: Opening Up the Fashion Archive

What does it mean to open the fashion archive today—and who gets to shape it?

UTS Gallery and UTS Fashion & Textiles invite scholars, curators, artists, designers, archivists, and practitioners to submit proposals for ‘Opening Up the Fashion Archive’, a two-day research symposium held 11–12 March 2026 at the University of Technology Sydney, alongside the exhibition ‘No place for Mannequins: Remaking the Fashion Archive’.

As fashion archives expand beyond institutional vaults into digital platforms, personal wardrobes, subcultures, social media, and AI-driven systems, this symposium asks how archives operate as sites of power, memory, experimentation, and resistance. We welcome scholarly papers, practice-led presentations, and workshops that critically engage with material, digital, social, q***r, decolonial, and participatory approaches to archiving fashion.

Indicative themes include:
- Expanded and alternative notions of fashion archives
- Q***r, decolonial, and counter-archival practices
- personal and community-based archives
- the impact of digital platforms and resale economies
- AI and generative approaches to fashion memory
- The relationship between archival work, sustainability, and ecological or social justice imperatives
*See link in bio for a wider suggestion of possible thematics.

Submission deadline extended to 15 January 2026.
Hybrid participation available for international presenters.

Submit a 250–300 word abstract and short bio via the link in bio.

Image: Femke de Vries in collaboration with Youngeun Sohn, ‘Telling Tremors: “Sheep have good memories”’ (moving image still), 2025. Courtesy the artists.

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