A celebration of the life and work of this prolific artist.

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“I’ve always been a painter, I was always drawing.”

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This exhibit of Putnam Contemporary Art Collaborative features over 55 paintings and drawings of Robert J. Lee spanning a diversity of size, media, and styles.

 

A prolific artist who, by his own estimations created “about seventy illustrations and paintings a year,” Robert J. Lee grew up in Northern California during the great depression. He studied at the Academy of Art in San Francisco, served in the US Army Air Corps during WWII, and fought forest fires in the Siskyou Mountains in Northern California before embarking on a long career in art, including teaching at Marymount  College in Tarrytown, NY.

 

Lee’s colorful illustrations could be found in children’s books, textbooks, magazines, and record album covers. For 38 years, Robert J. Lee resided with his wife Lucy in Carmel, NY.