It's no wonder Dowling has been voted The Most Collectable Australian Artist (2002) by Australian Art Collector magazine, she happens to produce excellent paintings. The artist's skill at drawing the figure, her use of medium for maximum effect and her attention to the surface of the painting, invites us forward to investigate what is being presented. What is being presented are stories of one family that spread out to encompass the wider community.

In this exhibition, Dowling introduces us to women from her immediate and extended family. Mature women who meet their responsibilities to the family, young women who question their place in the community, strong women who survive. Consider the three matriarchs, each obviously painted with love. These women stand in an environment special to them so Matriarch: Auntie Dot is located in a multi-coloured field of everlastings, Matriarch: Mollie is surrounded by the blue waters of Lake Moore, and Matriarch: Auntie Elsie stands in the warm heat haze of Broome. What's so compelling about  these works is how these women are portrayed; neither posed nor glorified, rather just as you'd find them. If we haven't met these particular women, we certainly know many like them.

Other series place black faces within a nimbus of colourful dots and marks, like Christian icons of Saints. The Yorga are not named, instead they are given titles relating to something  particular to each. For example, Sleep shows a child's peaceful face surrounded by warm hues and four concentric circles. She sleeps in front of a fire. Sun Down offers an older, suffering face. This woman has lost a son and a sister to alcoholism. River depicts a happy young woman with four blue lines running to her. She lives near the Swan River, her traditional home. They are mesmerizing in their individuality, and beauty.

Another series, Standin' Up, also displays women's faces surrounded by a decorative nimbus. But this time the icons are martyrs, the misused and abused. The works are smaller and the faces pained but determined. Each has a name, each is significant, each has survived and each is portrayed at the moment they decided 'enough'.

Images such as Warriedah (The Wedge-tailed Eagle), Sisters and The Visitors  provide scenarios that tell us about women having to deal with cultural ambiguities within themselves, between generations and members of the extended family. In this manner Dowling is continuing the oral history of her family. She offers lessons but does not preach, she explains but does not excuse, she reveals truth but does not accuse.

Three portraits impressed me most if for different reasons. One is The Dancer, because this older woman still hears the music and, one supposes, still moves with grace. Another is The Marban (magic) because this young 'spirit caller' is at home in herself. The third is Self Portrait: Black Bird because it shows the artist as her twin sister Carol Dowling describes her in the comprehensive catalogue essay; as a future matriarch and a healer to those who cannot see their own beauty and strength of spirit. She reveals that beauty and strength to those in her own family and to others in the wider community through her art.