Inside the Gazelli Art House Preview: Tales from the Caucasus

Abbey Villasis
Feb 3
2 min read

Caucasus Mountains, Image courtesy of Vyacheslav Argenberg via WikiMedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)

Caucasus Mountains, Image courtesy of Vyacheslav Argenberg via WikiMedia Commons (CC BY 4.0) — Caucasus Mountains, Image courtesy of Vyacheslav Argenberg via WikiMedia Commons (CC BY 4.0)

On January 22nd, 2026, a visit to Gazelli Art House in Mayfair was made to attend the preview of Tales from the Caucasus, featuring four artists from Azerbaijan and the surrounding region (Agil Abdullayev, Ulviyya Iman, Ramina Saadatkhan, and the Echo Activism Collective). The exhibition spanned three floors of the gallery. Reflecting on personal and societal transformation, it depicted contemporary life. The artists navigated everyday scenes, often infusing them with the fantastical elements of folk tales and myths.

While many of the artists were based in Europe, their works drew on stylistic roots from the Caucasus, engaging contemporary perspectives shaped by region, immigration, and a mixed, ever-evolving identity. The Caucasus is a region spanning Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is situated between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, comprising parts of Southern Russia, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.

Below is a peek inside the exhibition’s preview night.

The first exhibit visited was on the lower floor, Agil Abdullayev's film Radicals in Between Trees and Dicks (2024). Above is a still of the film, which follows individuals navigating 'cruising culture' in Azerbaijan and surrounding countries, societies where homosexuality remains taboo. Here, Abdullayev documents their own perspective and records the experiences of others in interviews, conversations, and visual recordings.

Gazelli Art House — Photo by Abbey Villasis

One floor up from the ground floor was a wall on the left displaying two paintings by Ramina Saadatkhan. To me, these works were unapologetically loud and did not hold back in expressing a private inner world. Saadatkhan does not seem concerned with appearing restrained or adhering to current trends; instead, she embraces bright colour as a means of emotional expression. It is easy to forget just how powerful colour can be in communicating an interior life. In these two works, I felt fear, love, tension, and excitement simultaneously.

On the third and top floor, there was a small painting hanging on a wall behind the staircase. Slightly removed from the main display, the work was Smell as memory, also by Ramina Saadatkhan.

Here is my boyfriend enjoying the exhibition. He was particularly drawn to this painting and observed how the woman is connected to the snake by the flower, forming a visual cycle.

Edited by Madeleine Rick, Art Editor