German painter Paula Kamps, known for her softly hued watercolours and ink works depicting fading figures and flowers, has died aged 36, per artnews.com.
Her Paris gallery, Sans Titre, confirmed her death on Tuesday, May 27, but did not disclose a cause.
Kamps’s work frequently addressed the transience of memory. She used thin washes of watercolour and ink to render figures and plants that appeared to be emerging or dissolving. Painter André Butzer, who exhibited alongside Kamps, described her flows of ink as “stains” for their resemblance to splotches or bruises.
Her subjects ranged from landscapes and still lifes to dreamlike portraits and surreal scenes, including a person smearing lipstick across their face, a man’s head forming a mountain range and three figures merging with leafy branches.
Born in 1990 in Cologne, Kamps studied philosophy at the Freie Universität Berlin before attending the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf. There she studied under Lucy McKenzie, later becoming a master student of Tomma Abts and returning to study with Elizabeth Peyton. She graduated in 2016.
Kamps relocated to Chicago and held her debut solo show at M. LeBlanc Gallery in 2021. The exhibition featured Granny’s U.F.O. (2021), an ink orb piece created by applying layers of ink and pigment to wet surfaces. She also used airbrushing in her process.
She began exhibiting with Sans Titre in 2021 and later showed with David Zwirner’s Platform site, Mou Projects in Hong Kong and Galerie Christine Mayer in Zurich. Mayer hosted a solo exhibition earlier this year. The show included “Mistress of Good Advice,” a poem by Kamps, who also produced artist books. It concluded: “All flowers wilt differently, / all of them are good at keeping secrets, and they never pick themselves.”
Kamps gained recognition in both Europe and the United States for works that merged abstraction and figuration, often engaging with themes of impermanence. Her practice extended beyond painting to poetry and artist books.
•Featured image: Paula Kamps/Courtesy Sans Titre
