[2][3][4] He documented construction of the Panama Canal with thirty canvases, and represented the United States in the 1928 Summer Olympics art competition.

His father Sverre Lie (1841–1892) was a Norwegian civil engineer and his mother Helen Augusta Steele (1853–1906) was an American from Hartford, Connecticut.

His aunt and uncle's home was a meeting place for famous artists such as Henrik Ibsen, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Edvard Grieg, and Georg Brandes.

He had already received drawing instruction from Christian Skredsvig in Norway, and Lie attended a small private art school in Paris.

In 1929, twelve of these were donated to United States Military Academy in memory General George W. Goethals, the West Point graduate who had been the canal's chief engineer.

Throughout his prolific career he painted brilliantly colored images of the rocky coves and harbors that identify the region's dramatic shoreline.