Born in Pennsylvania, Melissa Katherine has spent most of her life in North Carolina. In the years following her graduation from East Carolina University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting, she has participated in many exhibits throughout the state, has won a host of awards for her work, and her paintings form part of the permanent collections at Lenoir Rhyne College and the Rock School Arts Foundation as well as being owned by private collectors in California, Louisiana, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas, and North Carolina. She now lives in Morganton.

Melissa currently focuses on mixed-media works on paper that feature the female figure immersed in densely layered, luminous surroundings. These fragmented figures demonstrate a contemporary re-envisioning of the human form made more striking – and more vulnerable – through infusion in textured, abstract space. Melissa is also known for her large canvases in acrylic and mixed media.