Paul Jenkins (1923-2012) was one of the most distinctive American painters of the second generation of Abstract Expressionists, whose signature poured and stained veils of luminous color established him as a defining voice of postwar transatlantic abstraction. Born in Kansas City, Missouri, he initially pursued his artistic training at the Kansas City Art Institute before moving to New York after serving in the United States Naval Air Corps during the Second World War. In New York he continued his studies at the Art Students League under Yasuo Kuniyoshi and Morris Kantor, absorbing the currents of the emerging New York School.

In 1953 Jenkins moved to Paris, and for the remainder of his career he divided his time between studios in Paris and New York, occupying a distinctive position at the center of the postwar transatlantic art community. His mature practice evolved from an early engagement with gestural abstraction toward the signature technique for which he is best known, in which liquid paint is carefully poured and guided across the canvas surface with an ivory knife, producing luminous cascades and translucent veils of pure color. His celebrated Phenomena series, which occupied him for decades, comprises hundreds of paintings exploring the endless possibilities of this method.

Jenkins's work is deeply informed by his engagement with Zen Buddhism, Jungian psychology, and mystical traditions, and his flowing painted forms are intended to evoke natural phenomena, spiritual states, and the sense of light as an animating force. He also designed sets for the opera and wrote extensively on his own practice. His paintings are held in the Whitney Museum, the Guggenheim, the Museum of Modern Art, the Centre Pompidou, the Tate, and other major international collections, where they remain among the most distinctive contributions to postwar abstract painting.