Catherine Fels was born in Kirksville, Missouri on Aug. 29,1912.  She attended the University of California, Berkeley in the early 1930's.  After WW II she returned to school at the University of Southern California in LA and earned her BFA & MFA in Print Making.  She taught art, art history, and art for elementary teachers (including setting up a Saturday art class for local children where elementary education students could earn college credit by helping to teach.)

Summers were often spent traveling where she obtained much of her subject matter.  She retired & moved to Taos, New Mexico in 1978. She died on August 29, 1991.