Kate Gottgens was born in 1965 in Durban, South Africa. Gottgens graduated from the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town, in 1987, and presented her first solo exhibition in 1993 entitled Modern Wonders. Following Gottgens’ inclusion as the only South African selected for Thames and Hudson’s publication, 100 Painters of Tomorrow in 2014, her work was exhibited at One Art Space in New York City, USA as part of the exhibition to launch the publication. To date, SMAC Gallery has published two monographs on Gottgens, Kate Gottgens // Paintings 2007 – 2015 and Kate Gottgens // Paintings 2015 – 2017.

Selected solo exhibitions include: Tired from Smiling at SMAC Gallery and The Meek at The Vault, both in Cape Town in 2017; Famine at SMAC Gallery in Johannesburg in 2016; Infinite Loop in Stellenbosch  and The Rising Sea at NUNC Contemporary-Antwerp in Antwerp, Belgium, both in 2015; MALICE Aforethought in Cape Town and Savage Nature at Espacio Liquido in Gijon, Spain, both in 2013; Merry Hell and the Dreambody in 2010; Asleep Inside You in 2009; and Little Deaths in 2007. Gottgens has exhibited in numerous group shows locally and abroad since 1988, most notably; the 8th New Delhi Triennale in 1994 and Scurvy at the Castle of Good Hope in Cape Town in 1995. SMAC Gallery presented Gottgens at MiArt in Milan, Italy in 2014, selected additional international fairs include SCOPE FAIR in Miami Beach, USA in 2014 and Artissima in Turin, Italy, in 2017, and artmonte-carlo in Monaco, in 2018.

In 2018, Gottgens was included in a group exhibition curated by Brian Shure at Planthouse Gallery in New York City, USA. She was selected by curator and academic, Marilyn Martin, as the featured artist for the Fynarts Festival in Hermanus, South Africa. Gottgens also exhibited a solo presentation with SMAC Gallery at the Sydney Contemporary in Sydney, Australia.