Exhibition -

"With this series I painted a world in which I once lived. Where bigotry was toxic and the depths of the forest became safe havens for teenage love. These paintings weave stories of secretive exchanges among queer youths, pushed beyond small town hell and into the nocturnal landscape of the forest and field. The ambiguity of these images, aim to recreate a queer adolescent experience, where rare but endlessly desired intimate relationships are treasured and thus hidden at all costs. With weary intensity and heated stares the characters I have painted, express the anxiety of being both the hunter and hunted".-Kris Knight, December 2007

Kris Knight's work has been gaining recognition since graduating from OCAD in 2003. In 2007, his work has been featured in national and international publications like enRoute, Descant, The/End, Toronto Life, NOW magazine and recently on the cover of EYE Weekly. He was also a finalist in the National Portrait Competition. This is Kris Knight's third solo exhibition at the gallery. 

Kris Knight gratefully acknowledges the support of the Toronto Arts Council for this series.

*Local portraitist Kris Knight describes his latest show as a "homo-romantic Halloween series." These works depict epicene young men in fields and forests who have, according to Knight's narrative, retreated from small towns to engage in clandestine gay dating rituals. The mood is stirringly chaste; Knight's boys are fatigued because, one presumes, they're looking for love and not necessarily sex, at least not exclusively. The subjects' relatively uniform physiognomy suggests both beatific suffering and come-hither coyness; their saintliness seems built on their alleged transgressions. Artwork $400–$5,000. — David Balzer, Toronto Life