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Kat Knutsen

@katknutsenart

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‘Loving Vincent' Animator
Founder of @thesirenscene

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In the final stages of this painting, I’ve been reflecting on how decisions driven by enormous profits can have consequences that ripple across generations. War is a large profiting machine.

History reminds us how often ordinary people inherit the suffering caused by an oligarch’s pursuit of wealth, power, and control.

But we have a choice in how we move forward.

We have far more to gain by standing together than by fighting amongst ourselves.

Perhaps the greatest threat to those who profit from division is our willingness to recognize the shared humanity within our cultural differences.

#painting #reflecting #history #Artnews by @katknutsenart

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3 days ago

Refreshing my Kilburn studio energy with some playful and exploratory drawing

#drawing #ideas #play #Artnews by @katknutsenart

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3 days ago

Progress shot of Queen palette study. by @katknutsenart

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8 months ago

Demo-ing a quick multi-figure sketch for drawing students today. We were talking about using scale and perspective to place figures in a basic setting.

#Drawing #Sketching #figurativeart by @katknutsenart

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12 days ago

The more I learn about history, the more I realize how deeply the past continues to shape our present.

Working on this painting has taken me down a path of discovery, from the Balfour Declaration of 1917 to the far-reaching consequences of imperialism, colonialism, and the political decisions made generations before us.

What has struck me most is how the ambitions of powerful institutions can ripple across centuries, shaping borders, identities, conflicts, and the lives of people who had no voice in those decisions.

And yet, history isn’t just something that happened to us. It’s something we continue to participate in.

We inherit the consequences of decisions we never made, but we still have a choice in how we respond to them.

We can perpetuate division, or we can recognize our shared humanity. We can allow fear and resentment to shape the future, or we can choose compassion, understanding, and solidarity.

In this painting, the figures coming together represent that possibility. Not the erasure of history or our differences, but the recognition that peace requires us to see one another as human beings first.

The fallen figures below serve as a reminder of the human cost of greed and the pursuit of power.

I’m still learning, still painting, and still reflecting on the complicated history that brought us here.

But one thought continues to guide this work:

We cannot rewrite the past, but we can refuse to repeat its cruelties.

And perhaps that is where real change begins. 🕊️

#ContemporaryArt #ArtAndHistory #PoliticalArt #FigurativePainting #ArtForPeace TheSirenScene by @katknutsenart

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7 days ago

Playing with shapes while reading the news

#Drawing #Cornell57case by @katknutsenart

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18 days ago

What might have happened if the promises of the early 20th century had been made with greater care?

During World War I, Britain was making decisions about a region still under Ottoman rule. In the 1915–16 Hussein–McMahon correspondence, British officials discussed support for Arab independence, though whether Palestine was included became a lasting point of dispute.

Then, in 1917, the Balfour Declaration announced British support for “a national home for the Jewish people” in Palestine, while also stating that the civil and religious rights of the existing non-Jewish population should not be prejudiced. These competing aspirations were later folded into the British Mandate for Palestine, which formally charged Britain with facilitating a Jewish national home while safeguarding the rights of all inhabitants.

More than a century later, hindsight makes one thing painfully clear: promises made by powerful governments can outlive the people who made them.

The handshake in the middle is of different parts of humanity recognizing itself in unity, and dismantling imperialism’s bureaucratic approach.

Perhaps peace begins when history is no longer used only as a weapon, but also as a warning.

#Drawing #painting #figurativeart by @katknutsenart

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25 days ago

Drawing alongside my students as they take their first unit review. We’re learning about thumbnail designs, scaling up with the natural grid, and capturing basic forms.

#drawing #observing #create by @katknutsenart

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13 days ago

Painting update.

This work continues to grow as I read through the history surrounding Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s, and the ways imperial policy reshaped life on the ground long before the full consequences were visible. I keep returning to how power often presents itself as “order”, while quietly building systems of displacement, exclusion, and control.

What began in one historical context shifts in time. Those same administrative structures echo forward into the present, including here in the United States, where immigration enforcement and racialized suspicion reveal how prejudice can still move through institutions that claim neutrality.

This painting is becoming a meditation on that continuity, on the long arc between colonial power, legal systems, and lived human consequence.

But it is also becoming something else:
a reminder that repressive systems are not invincible.

Another figure will be added soon at the end of the composition, one that points toward the intensifying conditions in the U.S., but also toward the truth that when people recognize one another, stand together, and refuse division, oppressive structures begin to crack, and tyrannical administrations begin to fall.

Unity changes the balance.
And when unity holds, repression collapses.

#paintingupdate #artandhistory #contemporarypainting #figurativepainting #socialcommentary by @katknutsenart

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22 days ago

Having fun drawing squirrels

#draw #squirrels by @katknutsenart

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20 days ago

Organizing my studio a bit for the next batch of art and creative events 🥰

#Artistspace #katknutsenstudio #nbma taken in The Kilburn Mill by @katknutsenart

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3 days ago

Today we talked about playing with wandering forms

#drawing #3Dform #explore by @katknutsenart

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25 days ago