Spence Messih: A river runs through

  • Curator: Stella Rosa McDonald
  • 5 May – 21 August 2026
  • UTS Gallery | On tour from late 2026

 

The word ‘rival’ once referred to those who shared a ‘rivus’ (the same water or channel): people whose lives were linked not through conflict but through interbeing. This exhibition is not a neat analogy between gender and water, but an invitation to stay with their struggles, their autonomy, and their resistance to being fixed or fully known.

– Spence Messih

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.

A river runs through is in development to tour to regional galleries from 2026 in partnership with Museums & Galleries of NSW.

A river runs through is supported by Canberra Glassworks Artist Residency Program.

About the Artist

More information

logos for the Australian Government, Creative Australia, Victoria State Government, UTS Gallery and Art Collection, University Art Museums Australia, and Canberra Glassworks
Partner Acknowledgements

A river runs through is presented in partnership with Museums & Galleries of NSW and supported by Canberra Glassworks Artist Residency Program.