Lee Weiss (1928 - 2018)

A former interior designer in the San Francisco Bay area, Lee Weiss moved to Madison, Wisconsin in 1962 with her husband, Professor Leonard Weiss. In California she studied color theory, design and drawing at the College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland from 1946-47.  In 1957, she worked with Nels Eric Oback at San Jose State College and in 1958 attended critiques with Alexander Nepote. She then began to work in watercolor and, before leaving California, participated in juried exhibitions. After winning several top awards, she had a solo show at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in 1962.

In Madison, as a busy mother of four young children, she continued to paint at night and to refine her technique. She developed innovative monoprinting and color lifting methods to layer washes of mixed colors while creating unique textures and shapes. She then added details later, from memory, to represent close-up views of subjects in the natural world. Today, she continues to paint and to experiment. She states, “I like the unexpected. All these years of working with watercolor have been constant discovery.”

In a long career, Lee Weiss has mounted over 90 solo exhibitions and has been represented in every major American watercolor exhibition. Her work has been reproduced and published in books and prominent watercolor periodicals. She is a member of the National Watercolor Society, received a lifetime achievement award from the Watercolor USA Honor Society, a Dolphin Fellow of the American Watercolor Society, a Fellow of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Art and Letters, and a life member of Wisconsin Painters and Sculptors. Represented by galleries, museum and corporate collections from New York to California, she continues to paint in her studio in Madison, Wisconsin.