Biographie
Demian Kniewald is an internationally recognized painter, mostly tied to Italy since he attended the Academy of Brera in Milan where lived for 10 years. He is primarily known for his opus "Enigma da Vinci", which associates famous renaissance painters on large oils on canvas, by telling a mystical story of the infamous Priory of Sion. There are also his unforgettable portraits of David Bowie, Jeremy Irons, Sigourney Weaver and others. Because he is interested only in works on unprecedented projects, in collaboration with the famous Italian writer, he produced 12 large-format images , which extract the key moments in the story of the writer's book "Nero 24". It happened for the first time that one artist painted in such way a narration of a book. For this unique project, the biggest Italian publishing house Mondadori organized three large presentations in Turin, Venice and Rome. Beside his remarkable painting skills, he is involved in video art since his early age and has produced lots of video projects, including the movie The Enlightenment ( Sons of the Silent Age) as a first of a trilogy The Enlightenment and the two part documentary Metamorphosis, dedicated to the late David Bowie.. Original Essay by Emile Sinclair for the Kniewald's Opus Enigma da Vinci: Demian Kniewald's Enigma da Vinci is an incredible collection of oils on canvas. He is one of the most mysterious living painters. His paintings can be found exclusively in private collections among carefully chosen circles of people around Europe, mostly in Spain, Italy, Switzerland and England. No official exhibition of his work has ever been organized and very little is known about this personality. Kniewald's obvious purpose is to cloak religious imagery as a revelation in the pictorial language of mysterious Priory of Sion, an ancient cabal religion playing it's role, as a powerful underground society founded in the 11th century, to protect and preserve a secret of Holy Grail, involving the bloodline of Jesus Christ. The Priory allegedly created the medieval order of Knights Templar as its military arm, and had a series of Grand Masters which included such notable historical figures as Isaac Newton, Jean Cocteau, and Leonardo da Vinci. The icons sprinkled throughout the work are plentiful and contain various religious connotations. Kniewald's work is of the highest technical quality and he uses composition devices, such as symbolism and use of color, that are common within sixteenth century renaissance art, while paying close attention to detail. Without any doubt, his technique and skills are brought to perfection by the use of brush technique, almost frightening for the 21st century painting. One of the first noticeable elements of those compositions is the way Kniewald uses most famous works of the renaissance masters, merges them into new images which lose their original identity by being blended into subliminal paintings revealing hidden messages, providing the viewer with the idea of a conspirators setting. Another striking element of this opus is Kniewald's startling use of color. Kniewald sometimes favors deep rich colors, sometimes again chiaroscuro, darkened backgrounds and pale skin colors, giving each set of the paintings different tone, as a possible way of emphasizing their various attributes, utilized to guide you through to the most important aspects of this collection. The light that emanates around the paintings also lends on the idea of other-worldliness. This is consistent with the idea that the subject matter of these pieces is sacred and of the holiest. The complete work is riddled with symbolism. Kniewald uses devices such as unveiled original texts from Templars' holy scripts to elevate the scene from the realm of the ordinary while also allowing the viewer to get caught up in the drama of the mystery. The composition methods that he employed are common among renaissance painters, but he displays his talents in the highest technical manner.
