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Title

Pan

1898

Artist

Sydney Long

Australia, England

20 Aug 1871 – 23 Jan 1955

Artist profile

Alternate image of Pan by Sydney Long

  • Details

    Date
    1898
    Media category
    Painting
    Materials used
    oil on canvas
    Dimensions
    107.5 x 178.8 cm stretcher; 155.7 x 228.0 x 9.0 cm frame
    Signature & date

    Signed l.r. corner, blue oil "SID LONG". Not dated.

    Credit
    Gift of J R McGregor 1943
    Location
    South Building, ground level, Grand Courts
    Accession number
    9017
    Copyright
    © Estate of Sydney Long. Courtesy Ophthalmic Research Institute of Australia

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    Artist information
    Sydney Long

    Artist profile

    Works in the collection

    143

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  • About

    When Sydney Long exhibited his art-nouveau masterpiece ‘Pan’ in 1898, it cemented his reputation as a painter who was leading a shift toward a more abstract painting in Australia. Praised locally, Long was also recognised by the influential British art journal ‘Studio’ as a painter of ‘imaginative design’ and one who, through works such as ‘Pan’, contributed a distinct vision to late 19th-century Australian painting.1

    Born in Goulburn, NSW in 1871, Long arrived in Sydney in the early 1890s. While an art student under Julian Ashton, he began exhibiting works at the Art Society of NSW in 1894. With his artistic debut - the critically acclaimed ‘By tranquil waters’ (purchased by the Art Gallery of NSW in that year) - Long initiated a series of bush idylls in which he increasingly abstracted natural forms for an expression of place based on moods of enchantment.

    ‘Pan’ is the finest of Long’s 1890s series of pastoral paintings. The work is set in the twilight of a gum-treed Arcadia, where the pagan god of nature plays his reed pipe to a gathering of nymphs and satyrs. Allusions to Pan’s music are used to visually transpose the landscape into a series of rhythmic art-nouveau arabesques, whose movement is echoed in the crooks and curves of the dancing bodies of the bush pagans. Fusing decorative style with mythological subject matter, Long presented an alternative vision of the Australian landscape, painting it not in terms of its representational qualities, but transforming it into an arena of sensation and emotion.

    ‘Pan’ is a key example of Symbolist-inspired painting in Australia. Symbolism was an influential late 19th-century movement characterised by works expressing ideas, mood and dream states over material realities, and its artists often employed art nouveau’s sensuous arabesque forms as a means of expressing these metaphysical domains. Pan’s subject matter similarly reflects the Symbolist resurgence of Arcadian pagan gods as poetic embodiments of bucolic liberty and erotic frisson.

    Reflecting the influence of international art practices, ‘Pan’ was something of a feat given that Long had not yet ventured out of his home state of New South Wales when he painted it. It may represent the influence of art journals such as ‘Studio’ on Long’s artistic imagination, yet ‘Pan’ also demonstrates his inspired interpretation of international art forms for a culturally specific and modern representation of the Australian landscape during the period when it developed as a potent artistic symbol of the nation’s identity.

    1 ‘Studio’, London, vol 13, no 62, May 1898, pp 268–69

  • Exhibition history

    Shown in 11 exhibitions

  • Bibliography

    Referenced in 42 publications

Other works by Sydney Long

See all 143 works