Leonard Knight, creator of the desert artwork known as Salvation Mountain has died. He was 82.
Knight died in his sleep on Monday at 1:40 p.m. in the Eldorado Care Center in El Cajon, where he'd been living for two years. Dan Westfall, Knight's friend and president of Salvation Mountain Inc., said Knight stopped eating more than two weeks ago.
"He realized he was never going to live at his mountain again and started to let go," Westfall said.
Knight's eyesight and hearing had deteriorated. He had to have his leg amputated. Physical therapy to use a prosthetic limb didn't take, and his body kept getting weaker.
On the Salvation Mountain Facebook page, hundreds have shared their remembrances of Knight and of visiting Salvation Mountain.
Knight spent almost 30 years building the colorful mountain in the Imperial Valley desert, just outside of Niland, Calif. Built out of adobe and donated paint, Knight worked on the mountain all day, every day. He even slept at the mountain's base in the back of a pick-up truck, with no electricity or running water. He bathed in the nearby natural hot springs. Westfall told KPBS in 2012 that Knight's resilience always amazed him.
"The ability to live out here (in the desert) with zero creature comforts through the summer when it was 118 degrees. He had so little consideration for himself. His priorities were the message, the mountain, and he came in a distant third," Westfall said.
Knight's message was painted across the face of the mountain: "God is Love." The rest of the mountain and the outcroppings Knight built over the years were all covered in Bible verses. Like some other outsider artists, (Rev. Howard Finster comes to mind), Knight had a conversion experience. After that, his zeal and a singular focus drove him to create an artwork with evangelical purpose. Leonard had no training as an artist. He learned to make adobe and visitors gave him buckets of paint.
When he first arrived in the desert in 1986, he tried to launch a hot air balloon to send his message of God's love to the world. When that didn't work, he stayed in the same spot and began building the mountain. Today, it's the size of a football field and three stories high.
Westfall said Knight recently told him: "All of my dreams have come true. More than I can possibly ask for."
Thousands of tourists visit Salvation Mountain from all over the world. Visitors run the gamut from hippies to the devout, snowbirds to photographers, and a lot of the just plain curious.
Knight and Salvation Mountain were featured in the film "Into the Wild," directed by Sean Penn, as well as in art books, on CNN, the BBC, and in one of Sue Grafton's Kinsey Millhone mysteries, "G Is for Gumshoe." Sen. Barbara Boxer declared Salvation Mountain a national treasure and entered it into the Congressional record. It has been honored by the American Folk Art Society.
Part of Knight’s ashes will be interred at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery in Point Loma (he was a Korean War veteran) and part will be spread at Salvation Mountain. Services have not yet been scheduled.
Last year, Leonard Knight was able to leave the nursing home for a day and visit Salvation Mountain. KPBS videographer Katie Schoolov and I went with him. Here is the video from that day.
