"Once Upon a Place 1" by Weston Lee

What makes you truly happy?

 I feel happiness when creating art during those moments when I am fully engaged in the process of making marks, exploring textures, and feeling a sense of the 3-dimensional-ness of forms and space on a flat piece of paper. When I feel wonder, when I am in the moment, when I am lost in the freedom of wandering.

Short Bio

Weston Lee grew up in Norco, a previously small town in southern California. In college he studied art at Sonoma State University and at Cal State University, Fullerton, earning a B.A. in Art at Fullerton with an emphasis in drawing and painting. Recently, he returned to school and completed his Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Nevada, Reno graduating in 2021. Lee was the recipient of the Graduate Dean’s Merit Scholarship Award at the University of Nevada, Reno in 2018, the Frances S. Gignoux Liberal Art Scholarship in 2019 and the Sierra Arts Endowment Grant from Sierra Arts Foundation, Reno in 2006.

In creating his art, his process of working involves responding to initial marks and abstract shapes rather than starting with a set plan, allowing the making of his compositions to be a process of discovery and exploration as he creates imaginary spaces inspired by nature’s organic forms, textures, and interwoven connections. 

He dreams in downtown Reno, Nevada in his live/work studio next to the Truckee River.

Artist Statement

Wandering is not knowing what may be next, what lies waiting to be found. It’s slowing down, seeing what is

there instead of racing past it or having thoughts of elsewhere. It is being in the moment. It is going somewhere

without knowing where the somewhere will be. There is a quiet excitement in the discovery of the unknown

while becoming lost in both place and time.

When drawing I focus on the process, the making of marks along the way as the composition develops.

I’m drawn to organic forms, atmosphere and the modeling of form in light and shadow, they offer space to

move about in and through, to explore, to feel a connection to, and a freedom.

I wander between the real and the fictional. Between the representational and the abstract.

~ Weston Lee