Bushfires ravaged Gippsland in the summer of 1897–98, covering an area of about 1600 square kilometres. The worst day, 1 February 1898, was named ‘Red Tuesday’, recalling that other day of horror so memorably recorded by William Strutt in his Black Thursday, February 6th. 1851.

John Longstaff visited Gippsland later in February 1898 to view the fires at first hand and collect material for a major picture. Gippsland, Sunday night, February 20th, 1898 was exhibited in a dramatic installation in his Melbourne studio in August 1898. A row of kerosene-lamp ‘footlights’ provided the illumination, and the effect was said to be ‘lurid and startlingly realistic’.