Arbon Lane was born in Reidsville, North Carolina and worked as a dishwasher, truck driver and in a textile factory. He started painting as a young adult, mostly traditional subjects. He stopped and didn't pick up a brush again until he was in his sixties. He works with house paint, often on pieces of tin. His subject matter is mostly of people and events from his childhood, trying to recall what was, for him, a happy time that went by way too quickly. Arbon also writes poetry.