Kat Asharya studied English and creative writing at Duke University, and did certificate work in film/video and women's studies. She graduated magna cum laude in 1997. She has directed various short films, which have shown both nationally and internationally, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. She has freelanced in New York on various film and video productions in a wide variety of positions and worked for Scott Rudin Productions. She has also acted onstage in New York, and she has danced in works performed at the Merce Cunningham Dance Studio and at Rockefeller Center's Chinese Information and Cultural Center/Taipei Theater.

She currently lives and works in New York, and attends the graduate film program at Columbia University, where she is studying screenwriting and directing.