‘Nothing is so beautiful as spring —/ When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; …/ The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush/ The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush’, wrote the English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, in ‘Spring’ (1877). Long's painting is also a celebration of spring and the beauty of the natural world, where all is fresh and lovely.

Long probably painted In the Spring in the Richmond Valley, capturing the bright burst of pinks and golden greens of spring, and conveying the mood, the feeling of nature beginning to bloom. By combining an image of a blossoming tree with that of a young woman in a fresh white dress, Long hinted at both the birth of foliage, flowers and womanhood, and the transience of beauty and youth.

Here, as in a number of Long's other works of the 1890s, a knowledge of the work of the Australian Impressionists Charles Conder
and Arthur Streeton is evident. A few years before Long painted In the Spring, Conder had worked in the Richmond Valley, painting images like Herrick’s blossoms c 1888 (NGA) and Springtime 1888 (NGV), in which he depicted stylised blossom trees and long grass, as well as a lady in a white dress. Conder left Sydney in 1888, but Streeton was still there and working in the Richmond area around the time Long painted this work. Indeed, the colour of the sky here is a pure Streeton blue.

Formerly known as Spring, this painting is now considered to be In the Spring, first exhibited in 1895 at the ‘Society of Artists exhibition’ (35). In 1895 Long sold the painting to A.G. Leslie who was, at that time, the honorary secretary of the Society of Artists.

‘Nothing is so beautiful as spring —/ When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; …/ The glassy peartree leaves and blooms, they brush/ The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush’, wrote the English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, in ‘Spring’ (1877). Long's painting is also a celebration of spring and the beauty of the natural world, where all is fresh and lovely.

Long probably painted In the Spring in the Richmond Valley, capturing the bright burst of pinks and golden greens of spring, and conveying the mood, the feeling of nature beginning to bloom. By combining an image of a blossoming tree with that of a young woman in a fresh white dress, Long hinted at both the birth of foliage, flowers and womanhood, and the transience of beauty and youth.

Here, as in a number of Long's other works of the 1890s, a knowledge of the work of the Australian Impressionists Charles Conder
and Arthur Streeton is evident. A few years before Long painted In the Spring, Conder had worked in the Richmond Valley, painting images like Herrick’s blossoms c 1888 (NGA) and Springtime 1888 (NGV), in which he depicted stylised blossom trees and long grass, as well as a lady in a white dress. Conder left Sydney in 1888, but Streeton was still there and working in the Richmond area around the time Long painted this work. Indeed, the colour of the sky here is a pure Streeton blue.

Formerly known as Spring, this painting is now considered to be In the Spring, first exhibited in 1895 at the ‘Society of Artists exhibition’ (35). In 1895 Long sold the painting to A.G. Leslie who was, at that time, the honorary secretary of the Society of Artists.