MUD gallery | ドロ gallery | ГРЯЗЬ галерея
An international gallery of experimental art founded by artist Vilgeny Melnikov in 2022.
The main focus is on pop-up and site-specific projects in Europe, Japan, Russia, and other countries.
The project was created on the basis of an old Finnish cellar located at the OfelyArt residence in the forest of the Leningrad region (Saint Petersburg, Russia).
The venue aims to study the transformation of exhibited works and the influence of time and the elements on the exhibition.
The gallery is open to collaboration.
Exhibitions
"TRACE"
17/05/2026 - 21/05/2026
2 Chome-4-17 Osaka, Otsu, Shiga, Japan
ドロ gallery
The exhibition “Trace” by Gleb Ivany explores the limits of human perception and the impossibility of fully preserving one’s presence within time. Drawing from Object-Oriented Ontology and Timothy Morton’s concept of hyperobjects, the exhibition approaches the world as a system of autonomous entities whose existence does not depend on human observation, memory, or recognition.
The works exist on the threshold between presence and inaccessibility. They point toward objects, processes, and traces that cannot be directly seen or conclusively verified. The viewer encounters only residues, deformations, and indirect evidence of something that continues to exist beyond the limits of perception.
Within this framework, human existence appears temporary and profoundly limited in scale. Things that remain hidden from human understanding — or are fundamentally beyond recognition — may outlast humanity precisely because of their autonomy and independence from the observer. “Trace” transforms the notion of the trace from evidence of presence into a reminder of how small and unstable the human perspective is within the infinite material structure of the world.
Artist: Gleb Ivany
2 Chome-4-17 Osaka, Otsu, Shiga, Japan
ドロ gallery
The exhibition “Trace” by Gleb Ivany explores the limits of human perception and the impossibility of fully preserving one’s presence within time. Drawing from Object-Oriented Ontology and Timothy Morton’s concept of hyperobjects, the exhibition approaches the world as a system of autonomous entities whose existence does not depend on human observation, memory, or recognition.
The works exist on the threshold between presence and inaccessibility. They point toward objects, processes, and traces that cannot be directly seen or conclusively verified. The viewer encounters only residues, deformations, and indirect evidence of something that continues to exist beyond the limits of perception.
Within this framework, human existence appears temporary and profoundly limited in scale. Things that remain hidden from human understanding — or are fundamentally beyond recognition — may outlast humanity precisely because of their autonomy and independence from the observer. “Trace” transforms the notion of the trace from evidence of presence into a reminder of how small and unstable the human perspective is within the infinite material structure of the world.
Artist: Gleb Ivany
AFTER TIME
03/04/2026 - 10/04/2026
2 Chome-4-17 Osaka, Otsu, Shiga, Japan
ドロ gallery
"After Time" is an exhibition about a state in which form ceases to follow chronology and begins to exist as a trace of an event that has been experienced.
"After Time" explores the state of displacement, when form loses its linear connection with time and becomes a residual phenomenon of what has happened. Sculpture and photography capture neither the process nor the result, but rather the moment "after" — after pressure, after cold, after rupture. The project offers the viewer a space of pause, where form exists outside function and chronology, preserving the tension of an experience rather than an image.
The exhibition unfolds in a traditional Japanese house, where the attributes of time seem to be concealed beneath a translucent orange netting. Photography, embedded within the living space and everyday Japanese objects, shifts perception toward a sensory dimension that lies beyond memory and time.
Artist: Vilgeniy Melnikov
2 Chome-4-17 Osaka, Otsu, Shiga, Japan
ドロ gallery
"After Time" is an exhibition about a state in which form ceases to follow chronology and begins to exist as a trace of an event that has been experienced.
"After Time" explores the state of displacement, when form loses its linear connection with time and becomes a residual phenomenon of what has happened. Sculpture and photography capture neither the process nor the result, but rather the moment "after" — after pressure, after cold, after rupture. The project offers the viewer a space of pause, where form exists outside function and chronology, preserving the tension of an experience rather than an image.
The exhibition unfolds in a traditional Japanese house, where the attributes of time seem to be concealed beneath a translucent orange netting. Photography, embedded within the living space and everyday Japanese objects, shifts perception toward a sensory dimension that lies beyond memory and time.
Artist: Vilgeniy Melnikov
TWELVE
25/11/2025
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
Project "Twelve" explores the state of a generation growing up after the collapse of the cultural pillars that were familiar to us.
The installation presents the contemporary generation confronting the distortion of familiar boundaries and the transformation of ritual.
A room without a roof — a metaphor for a world without natural limitations. In the center stands a festive table, set according to the traditions of the 1990s. However, tradition here is not nostalgia for an era, but rather a marker of rupture: if in the 90s ritual still existed, the contemporary generation faces its gradual disappearance.
In place of the main dish stands a deformed fountain boy — a distorted yet recognizable figure, symbolizing the rupture of innocence and the loss of familiar boundaries. His monotonous action transforms the table not into a center of family celebration, but into an altar of a new, post-traditional ritual.
A clock moving backwards creates the effect of broken chronology, where past and present are no longer separated. This is not an attempt to go back, but a demonstration of how time folds, forming loops and ruptures. In the philosophical terms of Deleuze — the "fold" is such a crease where different layers of experience coexist.
The artist shows that the contemporary generation inherits not tradition, but its ruins. Within these ruins, new models of behavior, new forms of ritual, and new ways of coming of age are born.
"Twelve" is not a story about destruction, but a dialogue about the emergence of a new order — one that has not yet found its language, but already demands space to exist.
Artist: Vilgeniy Melnikov
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
Project "Twelve" explores the state of a generation growing up after the collapse of the cultural pillars that were familiar to us.
The installation presents the contemporary generation confronting the distortion of familiar boundaries and the transformation of ritual.
A room without a roof — a metaphor for a world without natural limitations. In the center stands a festive table, set according to the traditions of the 1990s. However, tradition here is not nostalgia for an era, but rather a marker of rupture: if in the 90s ritual still existed, the contemporary generation faces its gradual disappearance.
In place of the main dish stands a deformed fountain boy — a distorted yet recognizable figure, symbolizing the rupture of innocence and the loss of familiar boundaries. His monotonous action transforms the table not into a center of family celebration, but into an altar of a new, post-traditional ritual.
A clock moving backwards creates the effect of broken chronology, where past and present are no longer separated. This is not an attempt to go back, but a demonstration of how time folds, forming loops and ruptures. In the philosophical terms of Deleuze — the "fold" is such a crease where different layers of experience coexist.
The artist shows that the contemporary generation inherits not tradition, but its ruins. Within these ruins, new models of behavior, new forms of ritual, and new ways of coming of age are born.
"Twelve" is not a story about destruction, but a dialogue about the emergence of a new order — one that has not yet found its language, but already demands space to exist.
Artist: Vilgeniy Melnikov
BOOBY TRAP
22/10/2025
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
- a dog crate that feels so comfortable to sit in when you're still a child,
- a trap for wild animals, waiting for its victim in the panic of flight,
- a rodent wheel in the form of a sphere that limits perception — you see the world around you, but you don't feel it,
- carefully concealed pest traps that we fall into again and again,
- exquisite dome-shaped birdcages where the elegant form distracts from the horror of captivity,
- transparent gel ant farms with tunnels, offering the illusion of freedom of movement under total visibility.
For each species, its own cage.
Artist: Kristina Rozhkova
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
- a dog crate that feels so comfortable to sit in when you're still a child,
- a trap for wild animals, waiting for its victim in the panic of flight,
- a rodent wheel in the form of a sphere that limits perception — you see the world around you, but you don't feel it,
- carefully concealed pest traps that we fall into again and again,
- exquisite dome-shaped birdcages where the elegant form distracts from the horror of captivity,
- transparent gel ant farms with tunnels, offering the illusion of freedom of movement under total visibility.
For each species, its own cage.
Artist: Kristina Rozhkova
I CAN QUIT SMOKING 1.0
05/04/2025
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
The exhibition forms itself as a way to become slightly different. The exhibition "I Can Quit Smoking" explores plastic deformation as a metaphor for existential shift. In the works of Vilgeniy Melnikov, form ceases to be static: it demonstrates its fluidity and capacity for transformation.
As the primary gesture, the brute force of heavy machinery (an excavator) is applied — a force that affects form as such and, as it were, changes the course of history and time itself.
Artist: Vilgeniy Melnikov
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
The exhibition forms itself as a way to become slightly different. The exhibition "I Can Quit Smoking" explores plastic deformation as a metaphor for existential shift. In the works of Vilgeniy Melnikov, form ceases to be static: it demonstrates its fluidity and capacity for transformation.
As the primary gesture, the brute force of heavy machinery (an excavator) is applied — a force that affects form as such and, as it were, changes the course of history and time itself.
Artist: Vilgeniy Melnikov
WARM
18/02/2025
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
A project about the slow freezing of a model.
In search of an utterly sincere photograph, this project was born — about capturing a certain limit of human endurance.
The performance took place in winter, outdoors, at a temperature of -7°C. The artist lasted 56 minutes.
Artist: Marina Abadzheva
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
A project about the slow freezing of a model.
In search of an utterly sincere photograph, this project was born — about capturing a certain limit of human endurance.
The performance took place in winter, outdoors, at a temperature of -7°C. The artist lasted 56 minutes.
Artist: Marina Abadzheva
THE BIRTH OF THE SACRED DEER
21/07/2024
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
A performance about the transformation of one’s alter ego. A red kimono, 15 meters long, created specifically for the performance — a certain allegory of a bridge to a sacred abode. Where through the smoke of wormwood, the sound of falling water, and the tactility of clay, a fusion of the real and the transcendent takes place.
Artist: Yuliya Sharkina
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
A performance about the transformation of one’s alter ego. A red kimono, 15 meters long, created specifically for the performance — a certain allegory of a bridge to a sacred abode. Where through the smoke of wormwood, the sound of falling water, and the tactility of clay, a fusion of the real and the transcendent takes place.
Artist: Yuliya Sharkina
THE REAL ALICE
05/02/2023
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
Installation "The Real Alice"
A colonial forest of objects, artifacts, thoughts, and feelings, creating interactions between itself and the viewer, turns everything into a "mad tea party."
In the Anglo-Saxon version of the dream, a person stumbles upon absurdity. And this journey — it is exhausting, draining, and aimless for them.
There is no truth, no honesty, no nobility in it. There are only fragmented, outdated connections that constitute a kind of "collection of oddities."
By undergoing a purification through the act of empathy — stripping away the sweet, desirable image of flirting with an imaginary world — we become more real and more honest. The sweet smoke of pop culture, so alluring, dissipates along with the colonial noise!
The world can no longer remain as it was and is being transformed.
The installation features ceramics by Oleg Kopin.
Artist: Alisa Gennadyeva
Text: Alisa Gennadyeva
Curator: Vilgeniy Melnikov
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
Installation "The Real Alice"
A colonial forest of objects, artifacts, thoughts, and feelings, creating interactions between itself and the viewer, turns everything into a "mad tea party."
In the Anglo-Saxon version of the dream, a person stumbles upon absurdity. And this journey — it is exhausting, draining, and aimless for them.
There is no truth, no honesty, no nobility in it. There are only fragmented, outdated connections that constitute a kind of "collection of oddities."
By undergoing a purification through the act of empathy — stripping away the sweet, desirable image of flirting with an imaginary world — we become more real and more honest. The sweet smoke of pop culture, so alluring, dissipates along with the colonial noise!
The world can no longer remain as it was and is being transformed.
The installation features ceramics by Oleg Kopin.
Artist: Alisa Gennadyeva
Text: Alisa Gennadyeva
Curator: Vilgeniy Melnikov
НАСТОЯЩАЯ АЛИСА
05/02/2023
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
The exhibition "The Approach of Zeus" is a step into the space between dream and reality. Here, the sculptural group is arranged as a single, cohesive work. And the objects represent certain phantoms of unconscious memory.
The exhibition is intended to be read in different ways:
one can see it through piercing fear, or through a state of being stronger than fear, or through a way of escaping it.
Project author: Vilgeniy Melnikov
Ofelyart residence, Russia
ГРЯЗЬ галерея
The exhibition "The Approach of Zeus" is a step into the space between dream and reality. Here, the sculptural group is arranged as a single, cohesive work. And the objects represent certain phantoms of unconscious memory.
The exhibition is intended to be read in different ways:
one can see it through piercing fear, or through a state of being stronger than fear, or through a way of escaping it.
Project author: Vilgeniy Melnikov
Contacts
Ofelyart@ya.ru
