Kris Knight

Kris Knight (born 1980), is a Canadian artist based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Knight's works are mostly portraits; Knight wanted to draw the human face as a child and it continues to be the main thing that he focuses on painting as an adult.

Life and career Knight was born in Windsor, Ontario in 1980, and moved to Toronto in 1999 for art school. Knight has three other siblings. Growing up in a bakery, where his mother worked as a baker, Knight's pastel palette was influenced by his experiences tinting icing used for baked goods. Knight mixed his color palette by using the technique bakers use to make cake icings - by starting off with a white base and later adding the tint. Drawn to the ghostly look of French 17th century portraiture(Baroque) because of the 'heavy white powder make-up that was in vogue at the time', Knight cited the pastels used in the work of Joseph Ducreux and Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun as an influence. The works of Thomas Lawrence, John Singer Sargent, Nicolas Poussin, Jean-Honoré Fragonard, and Thomas Gainsborough has influenced Kris Knight as well. Knight's subjects have mostly been young men or androgynous men, admitting that he has a fascination with "youth decay" - of holding on to one's youth: "Our society focuses so much on youth as the pinnacle of beauty that we become poisoned by the obsession of preserving what is naturally fleeting." Knight elaborates, "Within these portraits are elements of the garden and exercises in pattern work representing how secrets are rooted and grow with time. Other paintings note the bonds formed when secrets are revealed to those we hold closest."

Smell The Magic (2014) The exhibition was first exhibited at Gucci's Art Basel event at Spinello Project's pop-up gallery in Wynwood, Florida, sponsored by the Italian fashion house Gucci. Because of the exhibit location in Miami, Knight was inspired to use brighter colors in this body of work, saying that some of his new paintings are deliberately tropical but in an awkward "northerner's first day in the tropics" kind of way. Some figures of the paintings have Ouija board pointers for eyes, others have blossoms painted on their faces. noted as the "bible for men's fashion". In January 2014, a friend notified Knight that his painting's pastel color palette was listed as a color inspiration for Gucci's men's ready-to-wear fall/winter 2014 collection. Knight also cited singer Marianne Faithfull as a muse for the project after spotting a photo of the singer on Gucci's mood board. Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour was photographed wearing Knight's floral motif on a dress from the Gucci Cruise 2015 collection.

Knight's work was hand-picked by fashion designer Christian Lacroix to be part of a group exhibition, Carte Blanche a Christian Lacroix, at Musée Cognacq-Jay in Paris in November 2014. His work was featured alongside other contemporary artists who are inspired by the 18th century.

Other collaborations

In 2019, Penguin Books published Stilla Tillyard's George IV in its Penguin Monarchs series, with a portrait of the king by Knight on the cover.

In 2020 Knight was commissioned to paint Canadian folk musician Basia Bulat for the cover of her fifth studio album Are You In Love?

In 2020 Knight was nominated for a Juno Award for Album Artwork of the Year for art direction and design for Ensign Broderick.

In 2020 Knight's 2014 painting Wicked Shade was published as the German cover of Danish author Jonas Eika's novel Nach der Sonne (Efter Solen) which was awarded the Nordic Council Literature Prize in 2019.

In 2022, Dan Levy invited Knight to provide shadow paintings for Levy's character in his debut film Good Grief. The film debuted in theaters in late December 2023 and on Netflix in early 2024.

Notes and references