Resume
Selected Exhibits:
2024: "Artist as Curator", June 27 - July 28, Kehler Liddell Gallery, New Haven, CT.
2023: "A View of Humanity", June 9 - July 15, Five Points Arts, Torrington, CT.
2019: "For The Birds", Paintings by Jennifer Knaus, Charlestown Gallery, Charlestown, RI. August 3rd-August 26
"Tempera: Nature and Narrative", Attleborro Arts Museum, Attleborro, MA. Apirl 6-May 4
2018:"The Real Un Real", Western Connecticut State University,Danbury, CT. Sept. 4- Oct. 14
"The Imagined and Invented Figure" , Aris Moore, Jennifer Knaus, and Jennifer McCandless, Melanie Carr Gallery, Essex, CT, June 23 - July 22
“Portraits”, Curated by Susan Finnegan, Washington Art Association and Art Gallery, Washington Depot, CT, March 31-April 28
2017: "Summer Dreams and Myth" Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, RI. June 2 - August 6
"New Work" Summer group show, Carver Hill Gallery,Rockland, Me. July 7-August 6,
2016: “Not Your Mother’s Drawing Show” 5 Points Gallery, November 10-December 23
2015: “Flower Power", Paintings by Jennifer Knaus, Coastal Maine Botanical Society,
Boothbay, ME. August 15-October 18
"Flora, Fauna, Myth" Jennifer Knaus and Adriance DeGroff, Carver Hill Gallery,
Rockland, ME. July 3 - August 7
"Paintings by Jennifer Knaus", Five Points Gallery, Torrington, CT.March 19 - April 18
2014: "Us and Them", Carver hill Gallery, Rockland ME. October
"Of Beauties and Beasts", Clement Art Gallery, Troy, NY. July 25-Sept.20
"Fete de la Nature", Littlejohn Contemporary, NYC, July 10-August 23
Jennifer Knaus, EBK Gallery, Hartford CT. June 30 - July6
2013: Jennifer Knaus, Works on Paper, Canton Artists' Guild, October - November
"Our Expanding Circle"' Group Show, Paper New England, Hartford CT. June - July
2012: "Anomolies", Beinart Surreal Art Collective Group Show, Copro Gallery, Santa Monica, CA. Oct.
"Infinite Connections", Five Points Gallery, Torrington, CT. August - Sept 7
60 Artists 60 Years, Washington Art Association, Washington, CT. July - Sept 30
Hudson Valley Hierloom Seed Packet design, "Endless Blooms"
Plight of the Pollinators, Group Show, Field Projects Exhibition Space, Watertown, CT. June
Jennifer Knaus-Paintings and Drawings, Littlejohn Contemporary, New York, NY. Feb. 14 - March
2011: Art for Clearwater, Group Show Fundraiser, First Street Gallery, 526 West 26th St., New York, New York
2010: Enchantment, Curated by Zina Davis. Joseloff Gallery, University of Hartford Art School, Hartford, CT.
2009: Go Figure, Paper New England and the Hans Weiss Newspace Gallery, Manchester Community College, Manchester, CT.
Commentary/Herself, Curated by Rachel Siporin. June Bizantz, Jennifer Knaus, and Rachel Siporin. Brickbottom Artist's Association, Somerville, MA.
Archaeology of Wonder, Curated by Kristina Newman- Scott. Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT.
2008: Drawn, Paper New England and the Hans Weiss Newspace Gallery, Manchester Community College, Manchester, CT.
Tracing Identity, Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism, Hartford, CT.
Jennifer Knaus-Recent Work, St. Georges School, Middletown, RI.
2006: Jennifer Knaus-Recent Work, Canton Artist's Guild, Canton, CT.
2005: Self Evidence, Erickson Davis Gallery, Ivoryton, CT.
2004: Jennifer Knaus, New/Now, New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CT.
2003: On and Off the Wall, Dave Holzman, Julie Palmer, Jennifer Knaus, Canton Artist's Guild, Canton, CT.
2001: Women Artists of New Britain, New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CT.
1999: Recent Work, Kathi Packer, Nanny Vonnegut, Jennifer Knaus, Washington Art Association, Washington, CT.
1998: Women Through the Eyes of Women, Pump House Gallery, Hartford, CT.
Grants and Awards:
2006: Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism Artist's Fellowship
1999: Greater Hartford Arts Council Fellowship
Education:
University of California, Davis. M.F.A., 1992
Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, 1991
San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA., B.F.A., 1985
Selected Bibliography:
2015: Art New England Front Cover Image, Summer Issue
2011: Phantasmaphile: May 19th.
2007: Portfolio/This Month by Tracey O'Shaughnessy, Connecticut magazine, September Issue
2005: An Exercise in Anti-Gravitas by Pat Rosoff, Hartford Advocate, January 6
2004: To Know Her is to Love Her by Tracey O'Shaughnessy, The Waterbury Republican, Dec.19
2004: The Muse in the Mirror by L.P. Streitfeld, The Hartford Courant, November Issue
Teaching Experience:
1994 - CURRENT: Central Connecticut State University, New Britain, CT.,: 2D Design, Drawing One, Painting One, Figure Drawing
2010: Saint Joseph's College for Women, Design I
Northwestern Connecticut Community College, Special Topics - Advanced Project
2009: Hartford Art School, University of Hartford, Foundation Drawing Two
Quotes from press clippings
From The Real Un Real: Realism Now catalog intro by Gil Scullion, May 2018
“ Jennifer Knaus’ paintings provide the viewer with a super-sized helping of art historical references’ all presented in a consistently realistic manner that homogenizes the differences of time and space. The works contributed to this exhibition are all portraits featuring a central, female figure festooned with flowers, sporting an elaborate hairstyle and wearing patterned garments. Some of the portraits are so densely packed with detail they recall the jungle pictures of Henri Rousseau. The features of each of the subjects are so specific that it is impossible to think that they are anything but depictions of actual individuals. Their eyes reveal as much about the psychology of the sitter as do any of the surrounding details. In some cases they stare straight out at the viewer, penetrating the character of the audience as surely as they project the character of the subject. In other cases the eyes glance away either from coyness or rueful resignation.
The features of the sitters are rendered in a style reminiscent of 16th century Flemish portraiture. Deep shadows frame the faces that shine as if lit by an interior source. Most of the sitters wear extravagant headgear that would put Carmen Miranda or attendees of the Kentucky Derby to shame. Most of these are constructed from plants, vegetables and flowers painted in the manner of 17th century Dutch still lifes. The headgear and hairstyles are so captivating that it is easy to overlook the garments worn by the subjects. While the other referents reach back into history the clothing actually refers back to recent memory as it reproduces patterns from the 1970’s to the 1990’s, all printed onto polyester-fabrics. This ahistorical mash-up of imagery brings to mind one of the most intriguing theories about the composition of reality. This theory asserts that all events and all time exist simultaneously and that it is possible for the future to influence the past and present just as surely as the past influences the present and future. This runs counter to all common sense and perception but looks can be deceiving.”
From “Portraits”, Washington Art Association review in the Waterbury Republican-American by Tracey O’Shaughnessy, April, 2018
……..”Finally, Knaus seems as integral to this exhibit as she is anomalous. Her surrealist works of females crowned with bouquets of wild flowers, vegetation and even vegetables, draws as much from Dali as it does from Holbein. Here are porcelain skinned women right out of the renaissance, with mod looking shirts and tunics from the 1960s and headdresses from a fulsome Dutch florist. Have fun identifying the various Gardenia, Delphinium, ivy and fantastical forsythia that sprout out of the top of women with cupid-bow mouths and arresting gazes.
Knaus’ paintings are so jaw droopingly wild - in one case, a woman is not so much ensconced in ivy as dressed in it - that her painterly skill is often lost. This is a woman of uncanny skill and a satiric bent whose portraits are a wonder of imagination and meticulousness that makes us chuckle and gape, sometimes all at once.”