The Passing

Softly turned inwards, the Galah in The Passing seems to fold into itself—its eye half-closed, its form nestled among delicate grasses and ferns. Here, Gina Kalabishis captures a moment of quiet vulnerability, where beauty is tinged with fatigue, and stillness feels like surrender.

The Galah, often a symbol of resilience and adaptability, appears unusually tender in this portrayal—worn, watchful, and solitary. It evokes the subtle tension between endurance and fragility within a landscape under pressure.

Excerpt from catalogue essay by Tim Dolby:

“The birds she depicts… exhibit signs of distress, displacement, and vulnerability. Their habitats… are rendered in desaturated tones, echoing the fading memory of what once was.”

In The Passing, the familiar becomes elegiac. Kalabishis invites us to see beyond the Galah’s pink and grey plumage—to recognise a species navigating a world that is shifting beneath its wings.