Pan is dead (still life)

Pan is dead (still life)' depicts a sculpted head of Pan beside white gloves and a glass vase filled with white roses. Its literary title evokes notions of mythology and the spiritual force of nature. The painting highlights George W Lambert's interest in the appearance of objects represented in paint as opposed to the reality of those objects. The solid head of Pan and the fragile flowers exemplify his investigation: the sculpted curls of Pan's hair resemble the rose blooms, which have been sharply defined to create this conflict between preception and reality.

The work was painted following Lambert's performance of Pan in the play 'The awakening of Pan' (1909), for which he sculpted a clay head of Pan modelled to his own appearance, adding horns and curls characteristic of the allegorical figure. It is the plaster cast of this clay head that is represented in this painting.