"Use it up, Wear it out,
Make it do... Or do with out."
~ Annoynomous ~

A country girl, raised in the Berkshire Mountains of Connecticut and  in the Hudson Valley of Upstate New York, Kathryn has a great affection for the natural world. Since the late 1980's, her award winning collages convey the world as she sees it through Nature's eyes. Using found, recycled and painted papers, she relies on memories and her photography as she tries to reflect the beauty of the disappearing landscapes. Her father inspired her to draw at an early age and she continued into her teenage years drawing portraits of her friends and family. Majoring in Art in high school, her art teacher Reno DeRosa, made a great impression on her with his love for the subject, as well as art history. She continued on to Dutchess Community College in Poughkeepsie, NY where she received an Associate Degree in Humanities and the Arts with honors. At S.U.N.Y New Paltz, she majored in Education and English and procured a Bachelor of Science degree.  During her last semester, Kathryn was severely injured in a car accident . It took a year to re-learn to walk again and to do the many common things most take for granted daily. The act of sketching, after two months of  being unable to sit up, was a most welcome relief, and saved her. After many months of physical therapy and an undaunting spirit, her positive attitude and unwillingness to quit, had  her back at school and graduating. As her mother told her, "A quitter never wins, and winner never quits."  Upon moving to the desert of Western  Arizona, with musician husband, Tony, and son, Jay, Kathryn worked to obtain a Master's degree at Northern Arizona University while teaching full time. As an artist and an educator, Uster has taught from pre-school to college level, been twice, president and board member of Havasu Art Guild . She coordinated monthly meetings and very successful and profitable shows. Kathryn was also previously president of Alpha Delta Kappa, a women's educational sorority, and is in the process of completing a children's book. She also teaches art at her Acoma West Studio, and is currently creating music CD graphic art for recording musicians, as well as continual new works.  Kathryn is a member of the International Museum of Collage, Assemblage and Construction, and has an abstract  3- dimensional piece in the permanent Fluxus collection and included in their book, The Secret Lives of Artists by collage artist Cecil Touchon. She is also a juried member of AZ Art Alliance. Always with a love of the Natural,  Kathryn developed her collage work in 1987-96 using the paper coming from precious trees and discarded without care, to create beauty from a disposable society.

Presently, her collage Canyon Verde is being shown at the Phoenix Museum Gallery at SkyHarbor International Airport in Phoenix chosen from more than 100 AZ artists. The Arizona Valentine Exhibit, for the state's 100th birthday, is Kathryn's second time being chosen for this honor. Dawn's Gilded Breeze and Surreal Goodbye were chosen by the jury for the Fish Stories Exhibit there in 2004. Dawn's Gilded Breeze 1998 ~ 30" x 40" Paper Collage Also at this time, Kathryn has an Expressionistic collage exhibited for National Collage Society's 2011 Annual Exhibit at Kent State University in Ohio. In the past she has shown with the Women's Caucus for the Arts  and the Artists' Colony in Scottsdale, as well as in Sedona, AZ. Early in 2007, Shining Jewel, an acrylic painting impression of the London Bridge, was chosen for the Lake Havasu City Historical Society's poster and fund raiser, and Kathryn donated the painting to the museum there. ~ ShiningJjewel ~ Acrylic Kathryn Uster's choice is a bold color palette  for her award winning collage work inspired by the Fauve Movement painters of the late 19th century. wikipedia.org/wiki/Fauvism Exhibiting her art across the tri-state area, Kathryn has received several awards for her collages from Best of Show, Peoples' Choice, as well as, first place and other awards.  Her work is collected nationally and internationally.       *See her television interview with            Arizona Highways TV below: DEFINING COLLAGE ART...<CLICK

        
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