Return of the Gods
Artist
Thomas McKnight
(American, b. 1941)
Date1999
MediumAcrylic on Canvas
Dimensions64 x 72 in.
ClassificationsAcrylic Painting
Credit LineGift of Renate McKnight
Object number2011.05
DescriptionA self-identified wanderer, McKnight traveled to the sunlit islands of Greece after abandoning a brief career in the corporate world. In Delos, he was inspired by the ruins of a once mythical port city said to be the birthplace of the sun god Apollo and his sister, Artemis, goddess of the moon. McKnight incorporates those fragmented capitals, peeling frescoes, and trodden paths in "Return of the Gods" in order to provide a distinct texture and frame to the composition as a whole.McKnight returns to mythological iconography in his artworks, here featuring the sun of Apollo and the moon of Artemis in the fresco, central altar piece, and evening sky through the abutting doorway. The artist blurs the line between reality and imagination as he depicts layers of visual truth-in built space, created scenes, and in the presence of mythological beings intersecting both. He states, "One purpose of art is to create a greater depth to life by combining outer and inner reality."
Rendering his own vision of Arcadia (a Utopian vision of pastoralism) McKnight challenges the conception of classicism as extinct, and instead breathes life into his mythological figures and sparks conversation between contemporary viewers and the gods and goddesses of ancient Greece.
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