The Date (2021) interprets the exhibition notion ‘at peace’ as a state of mind and a coming to terms with internal conflict, being uncomfortable, and haviing an affliction with an immediate environment. This is called to attention by the ominous black dog and the garish colour palette influenced by German Expressionists such as Ernst Kirchner and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff. Both artists painted women, especially nude models and prostitutes. Yet Longe’s work is defiantly oppositional in theme to Kirchner and Rottluff’s compulsive male gaze.

The Date is resistant to gendered, heteronormative, and patriarchal systems (not merely individuals) as well as expectations to everyday social practices and conventions. This painting can be interpreted as the complex nature of being alone as a fugitive and intentional state of being. There is the exploration of a refusal to be defined by another person or become supplementary or secondary in the narrative. The work is less about this character's relationship or association to an unknown figure of any gender, which is absent from the frame, as this absent figure has become untethered to the textural environment, bristled and on edge, which Longe has carefully crafted.

The Date is a different thematic turn in Longe's practice, from reinterpreting well-known historical art to developing slightly autobiographical paintings inspired by everyday experiences.