Feather & Flight - issuu catalogue

FEATHER & FLIGHT Impressions of avian friends

FEATHER

& FLIGHT

Impressions of avian friends

April 30 - May 26, 2026

Salt Contemporary 33-35 Hesse Street Queenscliff, Victoria

EXHIBITING ARTISTS

BRIDGIT THOMAS

DEAN BOWEN

DIANNE FOGWELL

GILLIAN LODGE

GUS LEUNIG

KATE GORRINGE-SMITH

KAY GIBSON

MARTIN KING

SUE ANDERSON

Our feathered companions often signify freedom and hope. Bearing omens, singing songs, holding secrets. Marrying the earth with sky. Birds carry memories from prehistoric times, echoing through over 150 million years of evolution.

Feather & Flight brings together works by Bridgit Thomas, Dean Bowen, Dianne Fogwell, Gillian Lodge, Gus Leunig, Kate Gorringe-Smith, Kay Gibson, Martin King, Peta West and Sue Anderson. Each artist offers a unique perspective of the mystical and alluring facets of our avian companions. Nestled in landscape, in flight, watching over.

Previous page: Martin King, The Crossing Storm, etching, hand coloured, 56.6x57cm (detail)

Left: Martin King, Pages from the diary of lost souls, blue dan, Etching, drypoint, spit bite, photopolymer gravyre and chine collé with hand colour, 157x119cm (detail)

BRIDGIT THOMAS

Influenced by a lifetime of drawing and living by the sea, Bridgit Thomas’ work explores fish and marine themes infused with the richness of coastal environments, natural flora and fauna.

Focusing on the environment in which she finds herself, Bridgit brings a rich, multi-layered approach as she interprets what she has experienced through a palate of both natural and man-made elements.

DEAN BOWEN

Dean Bowen’s idiosyncratic paintings, sculptures and prints combine technical mastery with a fundamental directness and simplicity. His delightful spontaneity is achieved through the skilful balancing of creative inventiveness with a rigorous application of process and technique.

His paintings, bronze sculptures and prints address the human condition and are known for their renditions of personages, animals, urban and rural environments, and quirky characters that evoke the simple pleasures of human habitation in optimistic ways within the contemporary world.

DIANNE FOGWELL

Dianne Fogwell is a national award-winning artist and one of the most respected printmakers and artists book practitioners in Australia.

Born in Lismore, Australia in 1958, Dianne is an acclaimed master printer and founding director of print studios such as Studio One, Criterion Fine Art Press and Gallery, ANU – Edition + Artist Book Studio and Lewis Editions.

Dianne has been exhibiting since 1981 and has a long list of national and international solo, invited and group exhibitions.

GILLIAN LODGE

Now in her mid-80s, Bellarine Peninsula–based artist Gillian Lodge has enjoyed a career spanning more than 60 years.

Since moving from Melbourne to the Bellarine Peninsula, Lodge has increasingly drawn inspiration from her local environment. Native flora such as banksias, samphire, and flowering tea tree feature prominently in her work. While these elements are recognisable, her subtle palette and intricate rendering give her paintings an otherworldly quality—both familiar and slightly surreal.

Lodge’s technical skill is a defining feature of her practice. Using up to 20 fine brushes for a single piece, she achieves remarkable precision and detail. Her paintings invite close viewing, where their complexity becomes apparent, yet stepping back reveals a balanced composition with strong harmony and perspective.

GUS LEUNIG

Gus Leunig encapsulates a harmonious depiction of nature, animals, and life, through the unplanned intertwining of nature and landscape. Existing in complex worlds, his seemingly simplistic figures align with whimsical narratives and stories on canvas, representing intricate maps from the atlas of his imagination.

Based in Avenel, a small town in country Victoria, Leunig carefully crafts journeys through a colourful world of observation and playful insight. His organic and meandering line-work belies a meticulous eye for detail, leaving the viewer with fulfilment and intrigue. Leunig’s vibrant colour palette compliments these resolved details, illustrating the playful nature of the whimsical stories he conveys. A new day or mood from the eye of the beholder can allow different storylines to unfold.

KATE GORRINGE-SMITH

Melbourne-based artist Kate Gorringe-Smith works in contemporary and traditional print media in 2D and 3D form and installation. Her art investigates our relationship with the environment: the threats we create vs our connectedness with it. Kate’s work often references migratory shorebirds to illustrate the environmental connections that link us individually and globally.

She is also concerned with issues of human migration, cultural diaspora and displacement, and notions of ‘home’. These themes are central to her three major projects The Flyway Print Exchange, From a Home to a Home: a Story of Migration and, most recently, The Overwintering Project: Mapping Sanctuary.

KAY GIBSON

I endeavour to marry my materials with my subject. Some of my current work is on paper which I blind emboss with endemic plants. I paint my subject in gouache and then use a ‘fumagé’ technique, smoking and adding soot to the paper from a burning candle. Reduction drawing is used to create the final image, mostly of birds and other wildlife.

The imprint of the plant and the fumagé relates to fire and regeneration, a constant process in the environment. In other work I combine painting and traditional etching methods to portray my love of nature. I am fortunate to live and work in a place where I can experience the everchanging natural world.

MARTIN KING

Martin King has had over 50 solo exhibitions throughout Australia and has exhibited in many group exhibitions both in Australia and Internationally. His practice includes, drawing, watercolour, printmaking, artist books and animation.

He has worked as a lecturer in Printmaking and the VCA, Melbourne and, in 1994, was appointed Senior Printmaker at the Australian Print Workshop in Melbourne.

Martin King, Pages from the diary of lost souls, blue dawn, 2025, etching, drypoint, spit bite, photopolymer garvyre and chine collé with hand colour, ed 2/30 157x119cm | $6,600

SUE ANDERSON

Expressionistic landscape painter, printer and ceramic artist Sue Anderson lives and works on Wadawurrung country, Victoria. Andersons unique visual language is inspired by days out in the Australian landscape absorbing, observing and drawing.

From her earliest immersions into the Big and Little Deserts, and the volcanic grassy plains of Point Cook, her landscapes have included the coasts, deserts and forests of Australia. Her love of the bush is equally balanced by her affinity for the sea.

Her artworks express her joy in witnessing the birds, plants and animals within these environments, celebrating their unique character as well as her concern seeing the destruction of the natural world caused by human impacts and development.