I have been asked many times to describe what it means,” said David, “And I have always been reluctant to place words over it. To me, it is better to be left as a much more eloquent visual statement.”
He later added, “Look at it with your eyes! The bold red dress against a direct backdrop of solid boulders, receding to the strength and clarity of mountains and distant sky. And beneath are the swirling reflections in the moving fluidity of the water.”

This was painted in 2002 and posed by a river that runs close to David’s house in Woodside, Wairarapa. The figure is David’s wife Mary. She made the dress that she posed in, which David designed. A talented dressmaker, Mary has often contributed by sewing the garments in David’s paintings, the work ‘Ascendancy’ is a wonderful example of that.

The mountains in the background of this piece first featured in another of David’s paintings, his expansive landscape called ‘Spring’.

‘Landscape of the Soul’ is another painting that was exhibited in his exhibition in Florence, in Italy. It later featured in the Fishers Fine Arts Exhibition 'New Zealand Modern Masters' in Christchurch, from where it was sold to a private collection in Christchurch.

David's painting 'Skip' was completed in the early 2000's. The model is his daughter Catherine, when she was about ten. David said she showed great patience as he asked her to do the same pose over and over again, countless times.

Skip was sold from the Quent Cordair Fine Arts Gallery in the USA to a collector in Canada.

"'All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players,' as Shakespeare wrote, but I think he missed the most vital part of it all - we dance through life with joy.” - David Knowles.

'Ascendancy' was sold to a Bank Executive based in Boston in the USA.

Knowles' 'Almost an Angel', now hanging in a private collection, in Wellington New Zealand.