KP Brehmer (b. 1938, Berlin; d. 1997, Hamburg, Germany) was a graphic artist, painter, and filmmaker. Though unaffiliated with any specific movement, his work was grounded in a political dilemma: how to mobilize art as a vehicle for politics when historical catastrophes have corrupted that concern. He lived most of his life in West Berlin—a city divided by capitalism and Socialism—where he experienced the effects of the Cold War on a daily basis. He spent the majority of his career investigating ways to present political agendas and socialist beliefs through drawings, prints, paintings, films, objects, and publications.
Brehmer studied graphics at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf and the Atelier Hayter, Paris. He ran a studio in Berlin starting in 1964, and from 1971 to 1997 he taught at the Hochschule für Bildende Künste, Hamburg, with a guest lectureship at the Hangzhou Academy of Art in China in 1987–88. Solo exhibitions of his work have taken place at Edition Block, Berlin (2015), Raven Row, London (2014), Vilma Gold, London (2013), Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, Sevilla, Spain (2011), Hamburger Kunsthalle, Germany (1998), Alle Künstler lügen, Museum Fridericianum, Kassel (1998), Stadtgalerie, Saarbrücken, Germany (1985), and Museum Wiesbaden, Germany (1976), among others. His work has been featured in group exhibitions at the Serralves Museum, Lisbon (2015), Whitechapel Gallery, London (2015), Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt (2014), Museion, Bolzano, Italy (2014), Vilma Gold, London (2014), Tate Liverpool (2013), the 11th Istanbul Biennial (2009), Kunsthaus Zürich, Switzerland (2008), the Museum of Modern Art, New York (1998, 1987, and 1970), Centre Georges Pompidou (1979), and Documenta 5 (1972) and Documenta 6 (1976) in Kassel, Germany. Together with Joseph Beuys, Hans Haacke, Klaus Staeck, and others, he organized the Art Into Society—Society Into Art exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, in 1974.
