Catherine Opie's photography is on show at Heide Museum of Modern Art in the first major survey of her work in Australia

Opie, pictured with her son Oliver, was born in 1961 in Sandusky, Ohio, a city located on the shores of Lake Erie. (River Callaway/Variety via Getty Images)

In 2010, the Obamas hung a series of photographs of Lake Michigan by photographer Catherine Opie in the White House.

It marked a dramatic passage from the margins of society to the mainstream for Opie, who began her career documenting queer culture at the height of the AIDS epidemic in the 80s and 90s.