Using analog and digital processes, Austin Lee blends abstraction and figuration, humor and pathos, in exuberant paintings and sculptures that evoke the early days of the Internet.

He first creates mock-ups for many of his canvases using virtual reality modeling software (an update to Photoshop, which he used earlier in his career) and 3D prints many of his sculptures in bronze and plastic. Lee then recreates a distinctly digital aesthetic using airbrushes and paintbrushes.

Working on both small and large scales, the artist saturates his works with luminous, electric hues. Humans, animals, and hybrid creatures are frequent motifs, and Lee understands his hand-painted compositions and structures as animated representations of his own feelings.

He studied at the Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia before earning his MFA from Yale in 2013. Since then, he has exhibited in New York, Stockholm, London, Paris, Berlin, Beijing, Hong Kong and Tokyo, among other cities.