Katrina’s love for art started at a very young age. One day at the age of three Katrina got her hands on a pencil and proceeded to cover her bedroom walls with the most amazing drawings and doodles. Her parents, who were a bit angry because they were renting the apartment and realized they would not get their security deposit back, were amazed at the amount of detail and imagination Katrina showed in the drawings and doodles. 

Katrina’s father searched high and low for paper, wood boards, anything Katrina could draw on that would not anger the landlord. He wound up making a deal with the local newspaper. Katrina’s father would perform janitorial services at the local newspaper and be paid in blank sheets of paper of various shapes, sizes and color. He would work at the newspaper until the family immigrated to the United States.

Below is a small sample of Katrina’s drawing. They were found in a box in a back storage room of an abandoned gas station mini mart. Only a small number of drawings were able to be saved and restored. 

Katrina Wasski was born in Eastern Europe in 1911. She immigrated to the United States with her parents in 1917. They lived in Milwaukee. Katina’s father worked as the night janitor at the Voom Voom Room strip club in downtown Milwaukee and Katrina’s mother darned socks for the orphans at Our Lady of Perpetual Chastity on the southside of Milwaukee.

Katrina was a very curious girl. She enjoyed the outdoors and loved to explore new and different places. Katrina was a master of the Milwaukee Bus system. She knew all the tricks for transferring from one bus route to another. She always had a complete set of bus schedules in her purse. Everyday was a new experience and new discovery.

Katrina had an eye for beauty even in the most dirty and disgusting settings. Katrina could find beauty in a junkyard or garbage dump. It was the way she looked at her subjects. The angles, the lighting and the backgrounds. Katrina’s father suggested photography. As he put it, “Art is fleeting and constantly changing. Photography can capture a subject at the perfect moment or the only moment before the mood is lost.” Katrina darned socks with her mother in order to earn money so she could buy a Kodak Brownie camera.

Katina was in heaven. She took her camera everywhere. After several months she had enough photos to put on display for the public to view. She taped the photos in the hallway of the apartment building where she and her parents lived. It was there where Katrina was discovered.

Fremuth Schoenfield was a blind art critic. Fremuth could determine if the art on display was good by the aura it would cast. He was visiting a business woman that lived in the same apartment complex where Katrina lived. As Fremuth walked the halls, he was struck by the beauty of the auras he felt. He shouted from the hallways until Katrina came out and told Mr. Fremuth that those were her photos on the hallway walls. He called her a genius and wanted to sponsor her. Katrina was overwhelmed. Her parents were not too sure of this. 

Katrina’s life was about to change …