The temperature shifts. Echoes of water drops from damp ceilings ping, on craggy walls. Shells, corals, pebbles, and mosaics fill every skerrick of space. Nymphs emerge from rocks, while algae and moss creep across their surfaces, enhancing the fusion of the natural and human world.
8 Wall Gallery is pleased to celebrate Érresh’s solo exhibition The Grotto, opening on Friday 17 July, 6-8 pm. Curated by Ashleigh Jones, The Grotto presents the work of Sydney-based Russian artist of Tartar heritage Èrresh (Ruslan Reshetov).
The exhibition's title evokes the grotto as a private, submerged, and hidden space within our interior lives, a space of retreat where the self can be encountered more freely. It reflects the ways queer experience has often required navigating spaces where aspects of identity remain in the shadows. Historically, grottos were not only natural caves but also elaborate, concealed retreats built within Baroque palaces, including those of queer monarchs, where one could luxuriate among fountains, water deities, and theatrical excess.
Èrresh's work embraces the unfolding of this interior world through imagery informed by myth, philosophy, and consciousness. Spanning painting, sculpture, video, and performance, his practice frequently draws on mythological figures and deities, employing materials as varied as stone and bone to create works that traverse the ancient and the contemporary, the symbolic and the personal.
Ashleigh Jones is the Curator at Fairfield City Museum & Gallery and a founding Director and Curator of Passage Gallery in Sydney’s Chinatown. Jones first curated The Grotto for the Sydney office of the international law firm Clifford Chance as part of Pride Month, and is now delighted to present this body of work to a wider public audience in collaboration with 8 Wall Gallery.
Friday 17 July – Saturday 1 August, 2026