Caroompas, Carole, 1946-2022

Carole Caroompas (1946–2022) was a Los Angeles-based artist known for her feminist and conceptual work, which explored themes of gender and power dynamics through collage, large-scale paintings, and performance. Spanning five decades, her art reflects a deep engagement with literature, mythology, and popular culture, incorporating fragmented narratives and diverse media to challenge societal norms, question contemporary gender roles, and offer alternative perspectives on authority, often with humor.

Caroompas began her career in 1971, creating works that utilized impermanent installations and uncommon materials. In her earliest exhibited works—Delayed Occurrences (1972), Falls (1972), and Egyptian Goddesses (1972–1973)—she explored ephemerality and anti-formal arrangements by pouring paint and glitter onto walls, linoleum, paper, and cardboard tubes.

From 1974 to 1985, Caroompas shifted her focus to collage, combining text, image, and found materials to examine gender through references both to herself and to literature and popular culture. Works from this period include Remembrance of Things Past (1976), Lost and Found: An Excavation (1978), and A Hermetic Romance from A to Z (1980–1981). Between 1978 and 1989, she performed narrative and musical pieces throughout Southern California that reflected the themes present in her visual art. She also released two music albums: Target Practice (1981) and La Lucha (1989).

After 1985, Caroompas transitioned to painting on canvas. Although she moved away from her earlier, more personal works, her feminist perspective remained evident in her new large-scale paintings, such as Fairy Tales (1988–1990), Before and After Frankenstein: The Woman Who Knew Too Much (1991– 1994), and Hester and Zorro: In Quest of a New World (1994–1997). Her series—referred to as "sets" by the artist and ranging in size from four to 26 pieces—employed fragmented narratives from literature, mythology, popular culture, and other sources to deconstruct sexist and authoritarian perspectives. Through these works, she posed critical questions and suggested alternative viewpoints on societal structures and hierarchies. This approach continued until her series Psychedelic Jungle (2004) and Dancing With Misfits: Eye-Dazzler (2007), in which she had decidedly switched to exploring existential themes like alienation, mortality, and the loss of Americana.

Following Dancing With Misfits, Caroompas created Uncle Lenny: Right as Wrong/Wrong as Right (2011), a body of ten works based on comedian Lenny Bruce that examined the artist's role in society. Her final completed work appears to be Hallucinatory Logic in the Sahara (2016), a series incorporating imagery from the film Lawrence of Arabia (1962) and popular representations of the Sahara Desert and its people.

Caroompas was born in Oregon City, Oregon, and spent her childhood in Newport Beach, California. She attended Newport Harbor High School, California State University, Fullerton (BA, 1968), and the University of Southern California (MFA, 1971). After graduating in 1971, she joined a consciousnessraising group with artists Karen Carson, Judy Chicago, and Miriam Schapiro. She later taught at several institutions, including California State University, Northridge (1972–1975), Immaculate Heart College (1973–1976), Los Angeles Valley College (1974–1976, 1980–1981), Cal State Fullerton (1976–1978), and the Otis College of Art and Design (mid-1980s–2020). Throughout her artistic career, she remained based in Los Angeles and was represented by local galleries including Jan Baum-Iris Silverman Gallery, Sue Spaid Fine Art, and Western Project. She passed away on July 31, 2022.

Sources consulted:

Carole Caroompas papers, accession no. 2023.M.25, Artist's statement, 2003, Box 83, Folder 2.

Otis Gallery, ed. Carole Caroompas: Lady of the Castle Perilous. Los Angeles: Otis College of Art and Design, 1997. Published in conjunction with an exhibition of the same title, organized by and presented at the Otis College of Art and Design, November 1997–January 1998.

Wagley, Catherine. "L.A. artist Carole Caroompas, performer and painter who bucked convention, dies at 76." Los Angeles Times, August 4, 2022.