Catherine is an American watercolor artist living and working in Northern New Jersey. She attended Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York and graduated in 2000 with a Bachelors Degree in Communications Design with a major in Illustration. She is a lifelong lover of watercolor and focuses on that medium with great detail while creating unapologetically feminine work which represents the stories of important women in her life as well as her own. Catherine is also a graphic designer and is the former owner of a small independent invitation design firm. She has been an art and design instructor for over 20 years and is a member of the American Watercolor Society. Her award winning work has been featured in several publications, gallery shows and is part of many private collections across the United States.

ARTIST’S STATEMENT

Catherine Kiff-Vozza is American watercolor artist whose paintings are inherently feminine and bold as they are inspired by the stories of women through various experiences in their lives. She utilizes vibrant color and imagery to depict the complex of emotions of those life experiences. Catherine’s paintings are highly layered with transparent watercolor glazes in order to create dimension within the forms and bring them to life. Her work includes a highly controlled use of watercolor achieving a level of realism.

Catherine uses roses and other natural forms as a vehicle for self expression and her life’s experiences as well as symbols of the effect of those moments. Within her portraits she creates stone-like women who are suspended in time with their suffering but like all of her work she demonstrates that out of that suffering there is also an inevitable vibrant moment of transformation and hope. Her work is filled with pain and tragedy poured on the page but simultaneously there is intense amount of beauty woven in the narrative; the beauty is both a symbol of that hope but also a demonstration of how women often feel obligated make those uncomfortable moments more palatable for the outside world. Catherine's most recent body of work explores the beauty that comes with the emotional scars women acquire as they move through their lives. She doesn’t just highlight them, but rather she celebrates them by adorning each “scar” of the dying rose in gold leaf. Catherine finds that these scars are precious to each woman and part of their unrelenting growth, strength and above all else, resilience.