Art Projects

Enigma da Vinci

In 2007 Demian Kniewald surprisingly opened to the public with the incredible new painting collection named »Enigma da Vinci«.
It is a succession of twenty one coordinate paintings revealing the secrets of Priory of Sion through the centuries and it’s grandmasters. The masterpieces of famous painters, members of the free masons’ order mentioned above, are blended and merged in a complex project, kind of a visualisation of what we have partly learned from Dan Brown’s bestseller »The Da Vinci Code«. Incredible attention to the details, masterful aproach and symbolism are just few of the superlatives, which can now be admired publicly.
The project’s subtitle »The revelation of the secret dossier of Priory of Sion« is definitely a dessert for our expectations and it just might seal the final chapter of the Holy Grail myth.
The greatest enigma of all is that this collection is available via internet now.
Demian Kniewald’s Enigma da Vinci is an incredible collection of oils on canvas which can be now found displayed on our website.
Demian Kniewald is one of the most mysterious living painters. His paintings can be found exclusively in private collections among carefully chosen circles of people around Europe, mostly in Spain, Italy, Switzerland and England. No official exhibition of his work has ever been organized and nobody knows who this personality really is.
Kniewald’s obvious purpose is to cloak religious imagery as a revelation in the pictorial language of mysterious Priory of Sion, an ancient cabal religion playing it’s role, as a powerful underground society founded in the 11th century, to protect and preserve a secret involving the bloodline of Jesus Christ. The Priory allegedly created the medieval order of Knights Templar as its military arm, and had a series of Grand Masters which included such notable historical figures as Isaac Newton, Jean Cocteau, and Leonardo da Vinci.
The icons sprinkled throughout the work are plentiful and contain various religious connotations. Kniewald’s work is of the highest technical quality and he uses compositional devices, such as symbolism and use of color, that are common within sixteenth century renaissance art, while paying close attention to detail. Without any doubt, his technique and skills are brought to perfection by the use of brush technique, almost frightening for the 21st century painting.One of the first noticeable elements of those compositions is the way Kniewald uses most famous works of the renaissance masters, merges them into new images which lose their original identity by being blended into subliminal paintings revealing hidden messages, providing the viewer with the idea of a conspirative setting. Another striking element of this opus is Kniewald’s startling use of color. Kniewald sometimes favors deep rich colors, sometimes again chiaroscuros, darkened backgrounds and pale skin colors, giving each set of the paintings different tone, as a possible way of emphasizing their various attributes, utilized to guide you through to the most important aspects of this collection. The light that emanates around the paintings also lends on the idea of otherworldliness. This is consistent with the idea that the subject matter of these pieces is sacred and of the holiest.The complete work is riddled with symbolism. Kniewald uses devices such as unveiled original texts from Templars’ holy scripts to elevate the scene from the realm of the ordinary while also allowing the viewer to get caught up in the drama of the mystery. The compositional methods that he employed are common among renaissance painters, but he displays his talents in the highest technical manner.

The Story Behind The Paintings

The story begins in absolute secrecy five centuries ago in Florence, Italy, when the greatest renaissance
philosopher and astrologer Marsilio Ficino, under enthusiastic patronage of Cosimo de Medici, the powerful
banker and merchant of Florence, translated Plato’s most controversial book “Corpus Hermeticum”, believed
to contain the central theology of the ancient Egyptians’ hidden wisdom with hieratic inscriptions as the
apex of pagan thought. Following suggestions by Plethon, Ficino tried to synthesize Christianity and
Platonism, thus creating a “new religion” which would become the foundation of the Renaissance – Rebirth.
The answer seems to be that Christianity was not as “original” as the Western Church thought it was.
Ficino realized that Christianity was a variation – an interpretation – of a group of followers of the
Corpus Hermeticum, specifically the cult of Serapis. His “new religion” was nothing more than restoring
Christianity to its roots.
The Corpus Hermeticum was indeed the “bible” of the Egyptian mystery religion of Serapis, the “true
bible”, i.e. the sacred literature which had been used in the training of John the Baptist and Jesus; it was
the bible of original Christianity, the Serapis cult. With the translation of the Corpus Hermeticum, Ficino
had the necessary material in hand to discover what society original Christianity wanted to establish.
Rush of enthusiasm for the powerful knowledge gained from this script landed Ficino in trouble with the
Roman Church. In 1489 he was accused of magic before Pope Innocent VIII and needed strong defense to
preserve him and de Medici from the condemnation of heresy. They required the assistance of bright young
men, who were willing to take centre stage. A young priest steeped into occult knowledge, Giovanni Pico
della Mirandola was such a man. Pico had arrived in Florence 1486 on the day when Ficino had completed
the translations of Plato’s writings. Together, they became the breeding ground of a conspiracy to try and
overthrow the Catholic Church by founding a secret society named AGLA, about which very little is known.
It was a bold attempt to reform from within, covertly, rather than from the outside, openly and aggressively
presented as a challenge to Church and Christianity. This secret knowledge was obviously very dangerous
since many people who got in touch with it lost their lives during the course of the past centuries, first
victim among them being della Mirandola, who died under very mysterious circumstances, poisoned in
1494, followed by many others, including some priests as well.
Knowing that his life was endangered too, Ficino urgently needed a follower and someone capable of
transforming his secrets into hidden signs and symbols: the first man who incorporated this knowledge
in his paintings was Sandro Botticelli. His application of this methodology is most visible in “Minerva and
the Centaur”, “Birth of Venus” and “Primavera”. All three paintings deal with occult themes and
represent the magical practice of drawing down planetary influences into images, as outlined by Ficino
directly. In short, name any Renaissance painter and you will see the guiding hand of Ficino behind the
painter, either directly or indirectly under control of his underground society AGLA. He painted through
others…
There was also a secret relationship between Ficino and Leonardo Da Vinci during which an idea of
painting parallel but heavily modified paintings was born. Botticelli was first to paint alternate versions of
the paintings mentioned above which included details not seen on the “originals”, full of symbolism
revealing the secret knowledge and therefore never exposed to the public. Instead of finishing them, he
passed them to Da Vinci to complete them. Da Vinci added some of his touches and even made some
new paintings of his own. 1506, after finishing the notorious “Mona Lisa”, Leonardo painted two more
alternative versions of the famous original and a year later, he met Albrecht Dürer and handed them all
seven paintings, including Botticelli’s. Ficino’s influence was obviously much wider than “just” Botticelli
and Da Vinci. Studies have shown that the German Renaissance artist Albrecht Dürer took his inspiration
from Ficino’s hidden knowledge as well, meditating on the secrets of wisdom, definitely having been
exposed to them during his presence in Italy. Dürer brought those paintings to Nuremberg, Germany
and started working on them. Following five years are pre-eminently the painting years of his life, but
1520 -1526 he painted “From Šumer to Golgota” together with Matthias Grünewald, as one of the secret
paintings in a row.
In the meantime AGLA became a movement that was elected to safeguard a frightening secret, whose
existence was a mystery. AGLA was, from its inception, only intended to attract invited members whose
names were even greater mystery as they were sworn to keep the extreme level of secrecy. Dürer,
obviously a member of AGLA, kept all the paintings until his death when AGLA took them to an unknown
location until they appeared eighty years later in the hands of Duke of Mantova who handed them over
to Peter Paul Rubens.
Toward the end of 1605, Rubens obtained leave from the Duke of Mantova to
continue his studies in Rome. Before he left, the Duke gave him the paintings and revealed him the
secret.It is difficult to understand the relationship between the AGLA and various artists, however it is thought
that glorious tradition to include esoteric symbols and passing their artwork on another painter is
perceived to be.
After Rubens met Caravaggio in Rome 1606, he handed him the paintings over but, after furious brawl
over a disputed score in a game of tennis, Caravaggio killed a person. In terror of the consequences of
his act, Caravaggio, himself wounded and feverish, fled the city and sought refuge in Naples, painting
the secret canvases. It is impossible to ignore the connection between the dark and urgent nature of this
painting and what must have been his desperate state of mind. At the beginning of 1608, Caravaggio
traveled to Malta, where he was received into the Order of Malta as a “Knight of Justice”; soon afterward
he was expelled from the order and imprisoned. He escaped, however. He meet with Rubens again and
gave him back the paintings and his work as he knew he wasn’t no longer in position to carry them with
him.
That same month Rubens returned to Antwerp. Although Italy had become Rubens’s spiritual home, his
success in Antwerp was so immediate and great that he remained there, and in spite of his extensive
travels later in his career he never saw Italy again. In the years of 1608 and 1628 he worked on the
secret paintings.
Throughout the following two centuries old paintings as well as newly made ones, switched hands numerous
times and AGLA operated all these wonders. The paintings were made and owned by names like Diego
Velasquez, Nicholas Poussin, Claude Lorraine, Giovanni Battista Gaulli, Gottfried Kniller, Isaac NEWTON, J.T.
Desaguliers, St.Germain, Count of Cagliostro and Jacques-Louis David. After the death of J.L.David 1825
paintings were taken by another secret organization, Priory of Sion, controlled by AGLA too, which handed
them over in the 30’s of the 20th century to Jean Cocteau, one of their grandmasters.
Using the help of his personal friend and painter Jacques-Emile Blanche, 1939 Cocteau completed “The da
Vinci’s Death” and finally concluded this incredible opus. During the World War II paintings were hidden in
South France, where they are still located.
The opus “Enigma da Vinci” which you are viewing at the present day is actually reproduction interpretation
of 21 paintings (of 22 existing) by Demian Kniewald who was introduced to AGLA secrets like dozens of
artists before him and committed to finally present these masterpieces to the world.