‘In the Middle of Somewhere’: Katherine Zimmer’s reality-bending photography comes home to Yountville for Art, Sip and Stroll
In the early 1990s, before smartphones turned everyone into photographers and before social media transformed travel into a curated performance, Katherine Zimmer was already chasing fleeting moments with a camera in hand.
Not the expected moments, either. While friends returned from vacations with smiling group photos in front of landmarks, Zimmer came home with very different images.
“People would ask, ‘Who are you with? Where are the people? What did you eat?’” Zimmer recalled, realizing that she didn’t have any touristy pictures. “I had pictures of interesting angles of architecture, moody landscapes, bits and pieces of sculptures and candids of strangers in piazzas. I had pictures of high contrast, black-and-white churches and marble and organic textures on fountains.”
That instinct, to capture the overlooked, the textured and the emotionally charged, has become the defining thread of a photographic career now spanning more than 30 years and currently showcased in her Yountville exhibition, “In the Middle of Somewhere.”
The exhibition, featured in conjunction with this weekend’s Yountville Art, Sip & Stroll, presents more than 50 images ranging from travel photography and layered reflections to vivid landscapes, collage work and abstract urban scenes. The show reflects Zimmer’s lifelong fascination with what she calls “reality-bending” imagery.
“I like to record things in unconventional ways,” she said. “My travel companions often say, ‘I was right there with you and I didn’t see that.’”
For Zimmer, art began long before photography entered the picture.
Growing up with her mother, Eva, whom she remembers as a woman with a “gypsy spirit,” she and her brother were encouraged to travel, explore and embrace different cultures from an early age. Creativity surfaced naturally. In high school, she designed her own clothes, experimented boldly with hair color and gravitated toward architectural and portrait drawing.
Although she never pursued formal artistic training, she immersed herself in studying artists and artistic movements on her own.
“I’ve always been interested in imagination and altered reality,” she said.
Early influences included Salvador Dalí, Andy Warhol and Wayne Thiebaud, artists known for transforming familiar subjects into emotionally heightened or surreal experiences. In photography, she admired fashion and portrait photographers whose work pushed realism into more dramatic and vulnerable territory, particularly Annie Leibovitz.
Photography itself, however, arrived almost accidentally. Zimmer was working in tourism and marketing-focused industries, including cruise ships and incentive travel, when she purchased her first camera in the early ’90s.
“I felt a need to capture what I was seeing,” she said. “The camera was a natural connection with quick results. Patience has never been my virtue.” Zimmer also dabbles in watercolor paintings.
A pivotal trip to Italy in 1995 deepened that connection permanently. “I became a full-fledged Italophile,” she said. “That’s when I found the art in my soul.” Florence, in particular, left a lasting impression.
Years later, that same love of Italy helped bring her to the Napa Valley.
“I moved to Yountville in 2005 because it was the closest I could get to Tuscany without moving to Italy,” she said.
Originally intending to launch her own marketing consulting business, Zimmer instead walked into the Napa Chamber of Commerce and unexpectedly walked out with a new career opportunity as the organization’s marketing and communications manager.
“It was the perfect job for me,” she said. “I got to support economic development and work with many different industries to grow their marketing and branding.”
Yountville quickly became more than simply a place to live. Zimmer spent years living in the town, first at Hopper Creek condominiums and later on Starley Street. She remembers waking to the sound of hot air balloons overhead and embracing what she describes as Yountville’s “small-town feel with a global presence.”
“I still love Yountville deeply,” she said.
Her ties to the community and local arts scene eventually led to her becoming the featured artist for the 2026 Art, Sip & Stroll event and the first named photographer to appear on the event poster in its 14-year history.
That opportunity emerged after Yountville Arts Commission Chair Ronda Schaer invited Zimmer to submit work for consideration. “I was astounded,” Zimmer said. “First because it’s me, [feeling] not worthy, and second because it’s always been paintings or drawings on the [Art, Sip & Stroll] poster.”
After discussions with Schaer and Arts Commission Vice Chair Noel Resnick, Zimmer realized the piece needed to convey not just her photography, but the feeling of the event itself.
The result for this year’s poster became a layered photographic collage designed to evoke the sensory experience of strolling through Yountville during the celebration, which includes art, wine, conversation, movement and community woven together visually.
“It’s a beautiful day filled with diverse creativity,” Zimmer said. “Families, couples, friends exploring all types of artistic mediums. Including the wines and amazing food, which are artworks unto themselves.”
That immersive quality also defines her exhibition “In the Middle of Somewhere.” Zimmer intentionally resisted narrowing the exhibit into a single theme or tightly curated visual style. “When I was asked how I was narrowing down the selection, I laughed and said, ‘I’m not narrowing it down!’”
Instead, visitors encounter a sprawling visual journey through decades of experimentation and evolution. Images are loosely grouped into categories including travel, street art, reflections, landscape and collage, but Zimmer hopes viewers wander through the exhibit intuitively rather than analytically.
“I wanted to create an overwhelming experience for people to get lost in and find their ‘wow’ moments,” she said. “I want to create discussion, sometimes uncomfortable discussion, but mostly imagination.” That willingness to challenge conventions has also shaped her approach to photography technology itself.
“I love art with the feel of quickly caught or changing imagery frozen in time. Generations moving through objects and changing it to suit their needs or visions. Maybe that’s why I am a huge fan of movies. Cinematography is such a beautifully fluid art form. Each frame is a still piece of art.”
Zimmer began with film photography, often carrying separate cameras for color and black-and-white images. She transitioned reluctantly to digital photography in the mid-2000s, still wrestling with traditional expectations about what constituted “professional” photography.
Eventually, physical strain from heavy camera equipment, combined with the spontaneity she craved artistically, pushed her toward using her iPhone almost exclusively.
At the time, smartphone photography was often dismissed by serious photographers. “There was a lot of judgment,” she said. “A lot of dismissal.” Zimmer pushed back against those attitudes publicly through art associations and advocacy work, arguing that artistic vision mattered more than the equipment being used.
“That’s when I found total freedom,” she said. Today, her process is almost entirely instinctive. She photographs quickly and spontaneously, often from moving vehicles or while simply walking through everyday environments. She gravitates toward reflections, layered surfaces, distorted perspectives, saturated colors and details that others might overlook.
Cropping, she admits, remains one of her biggest creative challenges. “I see things in every corner,” she said. “I often create multiple images from one capture.”
Even now, after decades of artistic exploration, Zimmer says perfectionism remains something she actively works against. “I fought really hard with perfectionism,” she said. “But I think I finally won by finding my style in the moment and then altering it wherever my imagination takes me.”
That evolving freedom extends to her views on emerging technologies as well. While she does not currently use artificial intelligence in her work, she sees AI as another artistic medium rather than something inherently threatening. “I believe it’s a new medium and should be treated as such, with full disclosure,” she said.
Zimmer’s personal life has also come full circle in recent years.
After moving to Southern California and spending seven years helping build tourism and arts initiatives in Escondido, she reconnected in 2019 with a long-time Napa friend, Pat Burke. The two began a long-distance relationship before she moved back to Napa Valley just ahead of the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020.
The relationship endured the pandemic, and the couple is now approaching their fifth wedding anniversary.
“I’m definitely living my best life,” Zimmer. “In love, retired, fully embracing my artistic style and enjoying Napa Valley fully.”
Today, in addition to her own artistic practice, Zimmer serves on the boards of the Art Association Napa Valley and the Downtown Napa Association, continuing to support the region’s creative and economic development communities through marketing and advocacy work.
Her art can also be found at Art Gallery Napa Valley in downtown Napa, where she maintains gallery space among a cooperative of local artists, as well as on social platforms including katherinezimmer.com and at @kz.photo.artist on Instagram and Facebook.
For Zimmer, though, the true reward remains the same impulse that first drew her toward photography decades ago: the chance to freeze moments and then transform them into something emotionally resonant.
“It’s never finished,” she said of her artwork. “The beauty of photography is that I can go back and create something new from an original or an altered piece, whatever inspires me in the new moment.”
Yountville Arts will present the 14th Annual Art, Sip & Stroll on Saturday, May 16, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. This is the Napa Valley’s largest visual arts event, an open-air affair offering visitors and valley residents the opportunity to enjoy fine art, wine and food. There is no charge to attend and browse the many displays on view in the center of Yountville. Attendees can walk the entire route or use the free Yountville Bee Bus to travel throughout Town.
For more information, or to purchase tasting packages for Art, Sip & Stroll on sale now, visit https://www.artsipstroll.com/.
