Cally Trench's earlier paintings include portraits, and she exhibited with the Contemporary Portrait Society from 1986 to 1992.

Portrait of Robert Hill as the Japanese actor Ichikawa Ebizo and Portrait of Robert Hill as Sidney the Seal were both exhibited with the Contemporary Portrait Society in the Medici Gallery, London in 1992.

Portrait of Dr Caroline M Fraser and Portrait of Mike Phillips were exhibited in Cally Trench's first solo exhibition (at Somerville College, Oxford in May 1985). Portrait of Dr Caroline M Fraser was exhibited with the Contemporary Portrait Society in the Bloomsbury Galleries, London in November 1985, and Portrait of Mike Phillips with the Contemporary Portrait Society in the Alpine Club Gallery, London in May 1986.

Reviews of Cally Trench's first solo exhibition in 1985.

Elizabeth Tom: Le Poer Trench (1985)

CT (Clova Tudor): Cally Trench (1985)

(Don Chapman): Cally le Poer Trench (1985)

In 1994, Cally Trench was commissioned to make six large paintings and a series of sketches for the Consumer Association's research and testing centre in Milton Keynes.

Cally Trench took part in public art projects in the late 1980s and early 1990s, including flying her giant fish from towers at Carfax, Oxford, and making art on billboards.

Cally Trench's earlier sea and river paintings reflect the combination of motion, pattern and stillness found in moving water. In many of them, the viewpoint is directly above - looking down onto and through the surface of the water. In some, the viewer or the artist's presence is implied by arms or a hand. In others, the viewpoint and scale are ambiguous.

The Beach at Lyme Regis was exhibited in Cally's solo exhibition Air, Sea, Sand and Sky at Wycombe Museum in 1999.

Hand in the River was exhibited in Cally's two-person exhibition with Paul Amey at the Isis Boathouse, Oxford in 1990.

Big Wave and Goldfish were exhibited in Red in Tooth and Claw at the Westgate Exhibition Room, Oxford, 1988.