His paintings, created to the very last detail using the techniques of the Old Masters, work with classical compositions while depicting a subject of central importance to their creator. That subject is the childhood of Jesus, but you would be mistaken if you thought Knap's idyllic scenes from gardens and interiors full of angelic song and violins were an attempt at hyperbole. Knap's idyll is not just a never-ending harmony. As we watch the Holy Household, where the Virgin is ironing, angels help out, and children are playing, we are forced to ask: What is Joseph doing there, outside the window? The calm is only seeming, the drama of salvation latently present. The multilayered nature of Knap's paintings, the symbols that live their own life, the radiant colors – all of it reminds us of the Pre-Raphaelites' notion that of the death of painting as represented by Raphael, and that it was necessary to return to the period before his emergence, i.e., the 15th century, when artists were still interested in faith and not artistry.
Mujer con Niños, 1986. Painting
Jan Knap
Mujer con Niños, 1986
Oil on canvas
Dimensions:
Image size: 44 H x 36 W in.
Frame size: 45 H x 37 W x 1 D in.
Unique
Signed by the artist
Jan Knap was born in 1949 in Chrudimi in the Czech Republic. Knap studied architecture in Prague and painting at the Academy of Fine Arts in Dusseldorf, between 1970 and ’72. In the 70s he moved to the United States (where he stayed from 1972 to 1982, living mostly in New York). In the late 70s he founded with Milan Kunc and Peter Angermann the ”Normal group’’: an anomalous group that brought together three resident artists, respectively Kunc in Cologne, Angermann in Nuremberg and finally Knap, at least officially, in Chrudimi and New York. In the 80s Knap’s pilgrimage continued: firstly he studied theology in Rome from 1982 to 1984, then from 1984 to 1989 he lived and worked in Cologne, and finally from 1989 to 1992 he moved to Modena. He now lives and works in Koln, Modena and in the Czech Republic.
