Lee was born in
Aledo, Illinois and attended
Ferry Hall School, a preparatory school for girls in
Lake Forest, Illinois, from 1920 to 1922. She graduated from
Rockford College in 1927 and studied with the
American Impressionist and Ashcan School painter
Ernest Lawson at the
Kansas City Art Institute in 1929. At the institute, she also met painter,
Arnold Blanch whom she later married after her 1939 divorce from
Russell Lee. Lee also attended the
California School of Fine Arts in
San Francisco in 1930. After her schooling, Lee moved to
Woodstock, New York and established herself as an artist in that community and settled there for the remainder of her artistic career. That same year the
Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired her 1936 painting
Catastrophe for its permanent collection. Her 1935 painting "Noon", was referenced in
Vladimir Nabokov's book
Lolita. During the 1930s and 1940s she created a number of lithographs for the
Associated American Artists. During the late 1940s and early 1950s, Lee undertook several commissions for
Life magazine, including articles and illustrations on travel to such places as North Africa, Mexico, and Cuba. During this time, her work became much more stylized with more concern to color and pure forms. She taught at
Michigan State University and was invited to attend
Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center as a guest artist. and the
Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, South Carolina. A traveling retrospective entitled "Simple Pleasures: The Art of Doris Lee", is planned for 2021-2023, and a related exhibit is at the Wigmore Fine Art Gallery in Manhattan in January 2022. ==
Thanksgiving==