Charles R. Knight (1874 – 1953) was an American painter best known for his detailed paintings of dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals. While famous for his paleoart, he also did wildlife art for non-extinct animals.
Knight's work did much to popularize Dinosaur and other prehistoric life to the public in the early-20th century America from being available in museums across the country note , usage in popular educational books, as well as also the basis for depictions of Dinosaurs in films from as The Lost World and King Kong to the "Rite of Spring" section of Fantasia and all the way to The Land Before Time.
Even as science marched on with the Dinosaur Renaissance
, Knight's work has remained a huge influence on both future paleoartists and how the public imagines Dinosaurs.
Examples in his work include:
- Accidentally Correct Zoology: Some speculative Artistic License on Knight's part in a few of his paintings would end up predicting future developments in our beliefs about Dinosaurs.
- Leaping Laelaps is one of the only pre-Dinosaur Renaissance paleoart pieces depicting fast moving Dinosaurs.
- His famous mural of a T.rex facing off against a Triceratops portrays the Rex in a horizontal position, more in line with how we portray Theropods now than the "Kangaroo" posture they had in Knight's other works.
- In 2015, a dinosaur named Regaliceratops was discovered that looked almost exactly like the Agathaumas note in Knight's painting—and it came from the same time as the Agathaumas fossils too!
- Animal Jingoism: Knight's Tyrannosaurus and Triceratops mural depicting the two aforementioned animals facing off did much to solidify the two as iconic rivals in the public's mind.
- Aquatic Hadrosaurs: Much like with his Sauropods, Hadrosaurs in Knight's art are depicted as semi-aquatic like they were believed to be during his lifetime.
- Aquatic Sauropods: In line with beliefs at the time, all of Knight's art featuring Sauropods has them submerged in or near some swampy area.
- Dumb Dinos: Provides the page quote, specifically in regards to Stegosaurus and T.rex.
- Ironically Disabled Artist: Knight was legally blind due to both astigmatism and an injury to his right eye dating back to his childhood.
- Mammoths Mean Ice Age: Zig-Zagged, as Knight depicted Mammoths (and Mastodons) in both snowy and warmer/greener environments.
- Panthera Awesome: His depictions of Smilodon invoke this. Some of Knight's non-prehistoric artwork featuring still-living Big Cats featured this, most notably tigers.
