Charles R. Knight was always one of my favorite artists. He is best known for the paintings he executed for our country’s great museums–paintings that make prehistoric ages come alive.
This is one of his renditions of Uintatherium, a walking fortress that exists no more. Well, naturally I’m going to groove on the prehistoric animals. But lately it’s been another aspect of Knight’s paintings that has captured my imagination.
His backgrounds.
Look closely. Take your time. Ignore the creature and study the landscape. I don’t know about you, but I would just about swear that Knight’s prehistoric landscapes were real places that he’d visited.
I know about that. I dream of places that are only real when I dream them. In fact, that’s how Bell Mountain started.
I know nothing of Charles R. Knight’s religious beliefs. But I believe that if the Holy Spirit wants to use you, He will, regardless of what you believe. If we approach Knight’s possibly real, possibly imaginary places in the right frame of mind, the Spirit might touch us, too.
God created the world and all living things, and pronounced them good. If He has Uintatherium safely tucked away in some unguessed-at corner of His universe, I wouldn’t be surprised if it were in a place just like the one Knight painted.
And who would be more surprised to discover that than Charles Knight himself?
Wow! That’s such a cool-looking creature!!
I can see what you mean, Lee. I can feel the place just by looking at the clouds, the trees, the water.
The Uintatherium in the background reminds me of something I’ve seen in real life. Some years ago, I was at the Denver Zoo and was watching the hippos. Mr Hippo was in the water but Mrs. Hippo was on dry land. She spotted a small branch over hanging the water on the far west side of the enclosure and tiptoed around the west edge of the artificial pond (cee-ment pond?) and stripped the branch of every leaf in one stroke. Then she tiptoed back away. You haven’t really experienced life until you’ve seen a hippopotamus tiptoe. 🙂
They are also able to run pretty fast–faster than most humans. And they tend to have short tempers, too. We don’t know what the Uintatherium was like: anything that looks that fearsome is bound to be patient and gentle. We hope.
One would hope so. I definitely wouldn’t want to be chased down by a giant Rhino.
Someone said(maybe you) that the reason God did not put dinosaurs on the ark is that they could not survive in the changed landscape after the Flood. 🙂