By Adam Blanchard
Kate LaPoint from Altona, New York, uses recycled materials to create extraordinary canvases, statues and sculptures. Surrounded by arts and crafts growing up, LaPoint has matured her skillset into something professional.
Now a senior at SUNY Plattsburgh, LaPoint majors in art with a concentration in painting, and has taken advanced classes in ceramics and sculpture.
LaPoint’s work displayed in the 2026 B.A. Art and Design Senior Show focuses on flora and fauna. With guidance from Assistant Professor of Art Bright Kontor Osei, Lapoint decided to use reclaimed materials found in nature in her pieces for her current painting series. She uses these materials as her canvases, with “Lost in the Meadow” being painted on a bike tire.
“He suggested that we focus more on concentrating on what we’re painting on, and how we can relate that to our practice,” LaPoint said. “It kind of went along with my themes of flora and fauna, and environmental issues, using repurposed materials like a bike tire.”
LaPoint maintains a simple, consistent creative process across each medium. She starts with a sketch, then finds discarded items in nature to use as a canvas. Finally she picks the color palette. LaPoint said she sticks with a vibrant color palette to represent nature reclaiming the materials she uses. This practice enabled LaPoint to get her piece, “Tiger Lily Moth,” in the Best of SUNY student art exhibition show.
After college, LaPoint plans to attend graduate school and get a masters degree in art education to work as an elementary school art teacher. Lapoint said she had great teachers throughout all of her schooling, allowing her to want to nurture the younger generation’s creativity.
Having grown up with art from a young age, LaPoint sees the world from an artist’s perspective. She thinks critically about the texture and color of plants, wondering how she can translate it into her media.
“I like how it makes me look at the world through an artist’s eye,” LaPoint said. “I notice things differently the more I do with art.”
