Edith Wiles

(b.1936-2018)

Leominster, Ma, USA

Edith was born January 8th, 1936 in Leominster Massachusetts, one of 6 children.  She began her college education at Fitchburg State College as an English major, but left school in 1955 to marry and raise a family.  

      In 1967, she began to paint, first without any formal training, and then enrolled as a Fine Arts major at the University of New Mexico.  

      In 1968, the family moved to Aberdeen Maryland, and she and her husband divorced that same year.

In 1969, she relocated the family to Holyoke Massachusetts to be closer to her family, and enrolled in the Fine Arts program at the University of Massachusetts, receiving her Bachelor’s Degree in Fine Arts in January 1971 and her Master’s Degree in Fine Arts in May 1972.

      Following her graduation in 1972, she was hired by Springfield Technical Community College to begin art classes as electives for the students.  While building the art department at the school, she continued to paint and spent the summer of 1973 as assistant curator of The Bitten End art gallery in Edgartown Massachusetts.

During her 31-year career as a professor at the college, she built the art department up from it’s start with only three course offerings to a full range of classes including independent studies and an honors colloquium.  She also continued to create and show her own works while teaching.  During her career she participated in 33 individual shows including 9 one-woman shows.

Prior to her retirement in 2003, she held a one woman show of all her remaining works at the gallery on campus.  

     After her retirement, she spent many years traveling, to enjoy firsthand the art and culture that she had spent so many years teaching to her students.  Her trips covered 37 different countries.

     In 2013, she sold her home in Longmeadow Massachusetts and moved to live with her daughter on her horse farm in Citra, bringing all her remaining works with her.  

     She passed July 23, 2018 at the age of 82.