The artist's father, Harrison S. Morris, a painter, served as director of the Pennsylvania Academy and as editor of Lippincott's Magazine. Her mother, Anna Wharton, of Quaker ancestry, whose father had founded the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, was an activist in prison reform. Morris accompanied her parents often to Europe, visiting such artists as Sargent, Whistler and Monet. At the age of 12 she lived in Rome where her father was appointed Commissioner General to the Art Exposition. When she was small they lived in Branchtown, a Philadelphia suburb. Later her father purchased farms in Philadelphia and Jamestown, Rhode Island, where he was active at the Newport Art Association.
Catharine studied at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women under H.B. Snell and Leopold Seiffert (1916-18) as had her Aunt Jennie Morris, a specialist in China painting and watercolor, in the 1890s.
In 1925 Catharine married Sydney L. Wright, a professor of physiochemistry at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School before taking up farming full time. From 1940-47 they operated Endsmeet Farm in Wyncote, Pennsylvania, and then moved to Fox Hill Farm, Jamestown, Rhode Island, where Catharine, among other things, taught art. Catharine was also active at the Newport Art Association.
Catharine's first dealer was Howard Mclees of McClees Galleries in Philadelphia, and later Robert C. Vose of Boston. She published two books of poetry The Simple Nun (1929) and Seaweed Their Pasture(1946). In 1957 her rather literary autobiography, The Color of Life, was published by Houghton Mifflin.
She was also cousin to George Wharton Edwards, NA.
