King is recognised as one of Australia's foremost contemporary printmakers. As well as completing residencies in France, Morocco, India and Antarctica, he has won numerous awards, including the WAMA Art Prize (2023), National Print and Drawing Prize (2022), Hazelhurst Art on Paper Award (2022) and Muswellbrook Drawing Prize (2019). His work can be found in public collections at the British Museum, National Gallery of Australia, National Gallery of Victoria and Art Gallery of New South Wales, among others. 

Martin King's 'Pages from the Diary of Lost Souls' offers a poignant meditation on the concept of the Tree of Life. The skeletal nature of the tree presents a stark irony - symbolizing not flourishing growth, but loss or absence. Scattered across and around the tree are the silhouettes of birds, haphazardly placed. Often they are not perched on branches, nor do they possess wingspans to suggest flight, creating a visual dissonance that evokes suspension, dislocation, or loss. Each bird is rendered in a solid, uniform tone, stripped of internal detail, which obscures species and identity. In doing so, King transforms them into graphic emblems: symbols of motion, memory, and absence.

This stripped-back iconography draws attention to broader ecological themes: the management of habitat, the erosion of biodiversity, and the fragility of natural systems. The strong compositional choices, contrast, placement, and repetition anchor these ideas visually, reinforcing the tension between presence and absence, life and extinction.

Senior Printmaker at the Australian Print Workshop since 1994, King's work is elegant, evocative and esteemed. Rooted in the artist's boyhood fascination with avian forms, the piece holds particular allure for collectors drawn to the mysterious and symbolic nature of life. The work is a diptych, which is further symbolic of many pieces forming a whole within nature, and this print.

Martin KING (1957 - )
'pages from the diary of lost souls, diptych' 2022
etching and chine colle on paper
Edition of 4
Image Size: 135 x 100 cm
Dimensions: 140 x 120 cm
Signed: Signed, editioned and titled under image
Comes with Letter of Provenance
Condition: Excellent
(c) The Artist or Assignee