My interest in painting was stimulated initially by my art teacher in Grammar School in Dorking in England in the 1940’s. Art at school was compulsory up to subject selection for ‘O’ levels. I happily grabbed art as an alternative to chemistry.
I shone at art in rather a lazy way winning school prizes. I got a university place on my general ‘O’ level results and the Principal at the College of Estate Management said let him do what he likes for ‘A’ level. I did Art, English and History. My art teacher was disappointed I did not go to Art College. I felt in those days there was no future except in ‘Commercial Art’. A talented contemporary of mine went to Art college, on graduation found herself paining ceramic door knobs. Having graduated as a chartered surveyor I came to Tobago in 1954. I am ashamed to say that, although surrounded by such natural and beautiful tropical scenery I did no painting at all.
Only in the early 1980’s when thinking of slowing my work pace did it occur to me that I could fill my spare time by painting again.
So I took up the brushes and set to. It took sometime to settle to it again. My work generally settles into an ‘impressionist’ style.
I had my first exhibition in 1986 at Gallery 1234 and my second at 101 Tragarete Road in 1998 and now I am having another with 101 Gallery at the Art Society in October 2009.
My paintings are usually landscapes inspired by the topography and botany of the island. Some are of the flowers that so enhance the beauty of the landscape. The mediums I use are oil paints, acrylic paints or soft pastels. I consider my water colours are dry and unsatisfactory, not the lovely wet and luminescent creations I aim to produce. Paintings never turn out to be what I preconceived and hoped they would be or representative of what I had in mind when I started them. They develop a life of their own. Contrary to general perception one is not struck by a wonderful burst of inspiration, only by the need to get on with the exhausting but satisfying work of painting.
People say ‘Oh you’re an artist”. I say ‘No, I’m a painter’.
David Knott
Dry Season
