Fahey is credited as being one of the first painters in New Zealand to paint from a female perspective and examine the domestic subjects of contemporary women's existence: children, the home, marriage, community life, and relationships. Fahey has said: "Art should come from what an artist knows about life, and if what a woman knows is not what a man knows, then her art is going to have to be different." Owing to their subject matter and approach, Fahey's paintings are closely associated with the wider societal women's liberation and feminist movements of the 1970s and 1980s. During many of her years as a practicing artist, Fahey did not have a studio, but instead painted on a large trolley, surrounded by the activities and energy of her family and household and following the action as it unfolded. Objects pile on top of each other, surfaces are intricately patterned, and figures merge with their surroundings. The oil painting
Christine in the Pantry (1973), held in the collection of
Aigantighe Art Gallery in Timaru, is an example of Fahey's manipulation of space, patterning, and depiction of everyday, prosaic objects. The women in Fahey's paintings often look directly out at the viewer, challenging or questioning the gaze directed at them. For example, in the painting
Final Domestic Expose – I paint Myself (1981–1982), held in the collection of the
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, Fahey is shown calmly contemplating the viewer whilst surrounded by a maelstrom of children, food, washing, cosmetics, and other objects associated with family life. Fahey often uses an impasto style of painting, where the paint is applied thickly and her brushstrokes are clearly evident to the viewer. For example, see the texture of the paint in "Fraser sees me, I see myself" from 1975, now in the collection of the
Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Here, Fahey does not disguise the materiality of the paint, but allows it to sit in thick layers on the canvas. In her work, Fahey also combines paint with collaged elements, such as the labels of food packaging, photographs, and other ephemera. For example, see the combination of
Tanqueray and
Schweppes labels, and photographs, in the painting "Mother and daughter quarrelling" (1977) from the collection of the
Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū. In the opening essay in the catalogue for the exhibition "alter/image", staged in 1993, curators
Christina Barton and Deborah Lawler-Dormer write that Fahey's "disruptions operate not only 'within' the world of the picture, but also 'at' the surface, where representational registers collect and clash." Though Fahey's paintings depict domestic life, the artist has expressed her antipathy for housework, and has written, "Whatever domestic skills I acquired were hard won. I found it all time absorbing and boring...When war broke out household help went into war work and we four girls were sent off to boarding school. Consequently I was bereft of domestic skills when I married. Cooking? I lacked that essential ingredient, confidence. Household tasks seemed like servitude to me. I tried, I really did, but I quickly understood that without painting I felt no personhood." Throughout her career Fahey has expressed a strong commitment to both the local environment and politics of Aotearoa New Zealand and to her figurative style. She never considered moving into abstraction, though she has acknowledged that there are abstract qualities in her work and would often turn her paintings upside down in order to reflect on the balance of colour and composition. Fahey's paintings can be found in major public and private art collections across New Zealand, including
Victoria University of Wellington's art collection,
Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa,
Christchurch Art Gallery,
Aigantighe Art Gallery in Timaru, the
Hocken Collection at the
University of Otago, and the
University of Auckland's art collection. ==Selected solo exhibitions==