To admirers of the best in contemporary British art, and especially to clients of this gallery, the work of Guy Taplin will need no introduction. But it does deserve a fresh tribute.

Now commanding substantial prices in the London auction houses, Taplin sculptures enjoyed a major success earlier this year in a comprehensive Cork Street exhibition. And although this artist has had numerous exhibitions with Courcoux & Courcoux Contemporary Art, a study of the work confirms an evershifting and soaring creativity.

While swans have long been among the most prized of Taplin images - with the late Jackie Onassis numbered among the buyers - the pose of the whooper swan displayed here surely has a unique grace.. And a pair of curlews appear to be limbering up for a Covent Garden ballet. Overall, an art that fledged decades ago, continues to wing into new realms of emotion and expression.

Guy has never felt tethered by a need for ornithological exactitude. "I cannot be creative if I am restricted to painstaking precision" he says. "Art must add to life". And indeed, it is this sense of freedom which gives the work its increasing potency and poignancy. But behind every image there lies an absolute love and infinite knowledge of birds. We are shown not only appearance and behaviour, but spirit.

Individual details may be pared-down or exaggerated to capture the essence of a living creature. Here, in an impression of an albatross, the graining of the wood is highlighted for a focus on magnificent flight feathers which, in birds with wingspans of up to 14 feet, can wing across vast oceans.

Even small-scale Taplin figures hint at the monumental - the precise attitude of a mistle thrush, or of a robin poised on a spade handle being profoundly emblematic. We may feel the bonds of familiarity with these garden birds, but we can only be awed by the acute portrait of a pair of terns, whose ancestors shared the world with dinosaurs.

And in flocks staked above driftwood bases Guy's imagination is now taking its most exhilarating flight. In this sample, six black ibis stretch and preen while a core of scarlet ibis is caught forever in a courtship dance. Meanwhile a mixed party of shorebirds sums up the endless variety of the wild world - and the endless scope of a wild talent.

Ian Collins

Ian Collins is an art critic and exhibition curator whose books include 'Birds of Creation: Guy Taplin' (Csaky Art) and 'A Broad Canvas: Art in East Anglia Since 1880' (Black Dog Books).

I can hardly believe that it is some five years since we last had a one-man exhibition of Guy Taplin's work in the gallery. Guy is one of my oldest friends in the art world - his was the very first solo show which we staged in the old Salisbury gallery some sixteen years ago and he has had quite a number of exhibitions with us since then.

There are milestones in every artist's life and I believe that the great success of his exhibition in Cork Street earlier this year established a solid foundation for the future. Taplin's sculpture has come a long way in every sense since the Salisbury show in 1985.

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