Press/Reviews

The Essence -
Gary Long has for many years, in his role as an illustrator, been concerned with the making of images. Now as a painter with a figurative base he is still involved with images; images that speak of the atmosphere of the coast, the sea, the sky and the weather.

Yet there is a crucial difference, for the images alone do not have our exclusive attention. The formal qualities of the work; the colour, line, edge, texture and the paint itself now compete equally to our senses.
We are made aware of the surface of the work, with an emphasis to its flatness, giving a real and actual quality, more 'object' like than simply a depiction of illusion and imitation.

Working from memory and intuition, Gary Long discovered in his pushing and dragging of paint his true subject and one that is intimately the very essence and 'stuff' of painting.

Stephen Dove