Issac Knight
Issac Knight
(1941−2022)
Florida Landscape
Oil on Upson board, undated
H: 33 ¾” W: 27 ¾”
Acquired from the artist in 2009
Issac Knight was born and raised in Tallahassee, the son of plantation workers. He moved to Fort Pierce in 1959. Knight was the brother-in-law of Al Black, who introduced him to Alfred Hair. He began his Highwayman career by selling paintings for Black and Hair. He remembered being turned away from galleries that refused to sell the work of these Black artists, so Knight traveled the highways, making sales in far-flung places such as Gainesville and Miami. He started producing his own paintings in 1968. When sales began to slump, Knight went to work for Northrop Grumman Aerospace, but he still painted on weekends. Knight continued to enjoy painting for the rest of his life.
