Nic Knowland BSC entered the film industry through still photography in the early 1960s, before establishing himself as a documentary cinematographer, working extensively on Granada’s World in Action through Alan King Associates.
During the 1970s, Knowland became involved in some of the period’s most influential documentary and music projects. He worked on BBC programmes including Horizon and became the regular cameraman for John Lennon and Yoko Ono, contributing to films including Imagine and Bed Peace. In 1969, he was also a founding member of Tattooist International. During the following decade he co-founded ICE, working with Aaton during the development and introduction of its new generation of Super 16 cameras.
Knowland subsequently became one of Britain’s prominent music-promo cinematographers, photographing landmark videos including John Lennon’s Imagine, Ultravox’s Vienna and Duran Duran’s Rio. His career also encompassed dance and physical-theatre films, including Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men and Strange Fish for DV8 Physical Theatre.
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Knowland worked extensively with director Tony Palmer on films exploring the lives and work of major classical composers, including Benjamin Britten, Igor Stravinsky, Giacomo Puccini and William Walton. He was also director of photography on Testimony, the feature film about composer Dmitri Shostakovich, starring Ben Kingsley, which opened the London Film Festival in 1985.
His feature-film work includes the Quay Brothers’ Institute Benjamenta, or This Dream That One Calls Human Life and their later digital feature The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes. His television career has encompassed drama and internationally produced projects, including Final Passage, for which he received a BAFTA for cinematography, as well as the Emmy-winning miniseries The Murder of Mary Phagan and Separate but Equal.
In the 2010s, Knowland continued to work across commercials, television drama and feature films. His collaboration with director Peter Strickland produced two particularly acclaimed films: Berberian Sound Studio (2012), for which Knowland received the Best Cinematography award at the BIFCA in Buenos Aires, and The Duke of Burgundy (2014), which screened in the main competition at the London Film Festival.
His later feature credits include England Is Mine, the 2017 film exploring the formative years of musician Morrissey, and Stardust (2020), in which Johnny Flynn portrayed David Bowie.
Across his career, Knowland has combined a documentary eye with an experimental and highly adaptable approach to cinematography, moving comfortably between observational filmmaking, music, drama and feature work. He has also played an active role within the British cinematography community, serving as a Governor of the British Society of Cinematographers.