Artist Profile: Michael Lee

Motion Captured in Oil

By Heike Hellmann-Brown

Ever since he learned to draw and color, artist Michael Lee knew he had found his passion in life. Growing up in Nashville, he moved to Atlanta to attend The Art Institute and obtained a degree in Visual Arts. I have always worked in the art field, he says. After graduating from the Art Institute I began my artistic career as a wildlife illustrator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Later, I worked in the advertising industry as an illustrator, graphic designer, and marketing manager.

After 20 years in the commercial art business, Lee changed course and put a focus on his fine art skills. My wife loves horses and used to ride competitively in the Hunter/Jumper discipline. As a birthday gift I painted her on a horse. I liked the motion I captured in the piece and continued to paint horse racing just for fun, he explains. Then, a friend submitted one of my works to a gallery, where it sold. That was a booster. I decided to start painting for a living.

Lee began selling his works at art and craft shows and continues to display at 28 shows per year in the Southeast. Meanwhile, his oeuvre focuses on images of horses, sports, and musicians. I still enjoy portraying motion, Lee says, although, over the years my style has changed. I used to paint realism, but felt that I had to develop my own style. I personally like the impressionists, such as Monet and Van Gogh. While initially it was hard to adapt, the looser brushstrokes give me more freedom to relay my artistic visions. Lees work is also inspired by LeRoy Neiman and his brilliantly colored, expressionist paintings of athletes, musicians, and sporting events.

Lee paints in oil, acrylic, pastels, pen and ink, and creates signature items by incorporating vintage betting tickets into the backgrounds of his horse-racing pieces. His artwork is on public display at the Menlo Museum of Art in Orlando, Fla.; the Olin Library of Rollins College in Winter Park, Fla.; and the Kentucky Derby Museum in Churchill Downs, Ky.

When not at his easel enjoying the solitude of painting, Lee can be found outdoors, hiking and backpacking the most remote places with his wife, Shelly, and their Australian Shepherd.

I am truly living my dream, Lee says. In the advertising industry I accomplished all the goals that I set for myself. Now I do what I love, and its a luxury I cherish. Painting makes me happy. There is nothing I would want to change. I built a collector base, buyers who visit me during my shows or in the studio. That gives me a lot of satisfaction. Its a personal thing for me to paint, and its equally personal to meet the buyer, see how my art piece makes someone happy, and hear how proud people are to have my work in their house.

MichaelLeeDesign.net