Lee Fritz Randolph

• Name — Lee Fritz Randolph • Born — 3 June 1880 • Birthplace — Ravenna, Ohio, United States • Died — 3 September 1956 • Place of death — Salinas, California, United States • Office — Director of California School of Fine Arts • Term Start — 1917 • Term End — 1941 • Successor — William Alexander Gaw • Predecessor — Pedro Joseph de Lemos • Education — Stevenson Art School, Cincinnati Art Academy, Art Students League of New York, Académie Julian, Académie Colarossi, École des Beaux-Arts • Occupation — Painter, printmaker, educator, academic administrator • Spouse — Marion Wilson Ellis (m. 1910–1927; her death), Hilda Southwell Bunt (m. 1933–1956; death) • Resting Place — El Carmelo Cemetery, Pacific Grove, California, United States • Relations — Louise Fitz Randolph (aunt)

Lee Fritz Randolph III was born June 3, 1880, in Ravenna, Ohio. His parents were Clara North (née Lee) and Rev. Reuben Fitz Randolph Jr.. His mother family was from Virginia, and she was a distant relative of Gen. Robert E. Lee. He studied at the Stevenson Art School in Pittsburgh, under Horatio S. Stevenson; the Cincinnati Art Academy (now Art Academy of Cincinnati), under Thomas Satterwhite Noble and Frank Duveneck; and the Art Students League of New York, under Kenyon Cox, and George Bridgman. He traveled to Europe for some ten years to study art; including at study at Académie Julian in Paris, under Jean-Paul Laurens; at the Académie Colarossi in Paris; and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, under Léon Bonnat. He later studied in Florence and Rome. His older sister Anna Randolph (1976–1905), committed suicide in Rome on December 27, 1905, two months after Lee had moved to Rome. In 1913, Randolph returned to California.

Randolph was a figurative oil painter, known for his landscape and portraits; and a printmaker, known for his etchings. He was a member of the Bohemian Club, and the California Society of Etchers (now California Society of Printmakers). He was also affiliated with the Foundation for Western Art, and participated in their group exhibitions in the 1940s. In 1915, he taught at the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) during the winter semester. He won a bronze medal for painting at the Panama–Pacific International Exposition, held in San Francisco. Randolph served as the director of California School of Fine Arts (or CSFA, now San Francisco Art Institute) from 1917 to 1941. He took a CSFA sabbatical from 1941 to 1942. In 1925, he joined the summer faculty of Brigham Young University's Big Alpine Summer School in the Mount Timpanogos–area of Utah. The Randolph family moved to Carmel-by-the-Sea, California in the 1940s, where he continued to teach visual art and was a member of the Carmel Art Association.

Lee Fritz Randolph is recorded as painter, engraver and teacher.