American, 1876 - 1955
Although Howard Giles demonstrated an interest in art early in his youth in Newark, New Jersey, his economic circumstances required him to work in a New York railroad office after high school. Through the generosity of a family friend, Giles was able to study under H. Siddons Mowbray at the Art Students League in New York. During the early 1910s, Giles was a highly successful magazine illustrator. He visited England in 1912 on a sketching trip for Scribner's Magazine.
That same year Giles commenced his long teaching career, accepting a position as life-class instructor at the New York School of Fine and Applied Arts, where he remained until the late 1920s. During that decade Giles also was a part-time instructor at the Childs-Walker School in Boston and lectured to groups in Boston and Cambridge. He lectured widely, including at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Detroit Institute of Arts, and Wellesley College.
Although he initially painted in the popular Impressionist style, Giles grew increasingly interested in the artistic use of scientific color theories that were popular during the opening decades of the twentieth century. From 1916 to 1919, he worked with Jay Hambidge, applying Hambidge's principles of dynamic symmetry to his work and advancing them in his teaching and lecturing. In the years he was active in Boston, 1922-26, he met the Cambridge-based aesthetician and color theorist Denman W. Ross. In adherence to Ross's principles, he adopted a set palette comprising a limited color scale of related tones.
In the years leading up to his retirement in 1934, Giles was dean of the fine arts department of the Master Institute of the Roerich Museum in New York. He then closed his New York studio and moved to Woodstock, Vermont. Thereafter he produced few oils, working mainly in watercolor-as he had throughout his career-and in pastels.
That same year Giles commenced his long teaching career, accepting a position as life-class instructor at the New York School of Fine and Applied Arts, where he remained until the late 1920s. During that decade Giles also was a part-time instructor at the Childs-Walker School in Boston and lectured to groups in Boston and Cambridge. He lectured widely, including at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Detroit Institute of Arts, and Wellesley College.
Although he initially painted in the popular Impressionist style, Giles grew increasingly interested in the artistic use of scientific color theories that were popular during the opening decades of the twentieth century. From 1916 to 1919, he worked with Jay Hambidge, applying Hambidge's principles of dynamic symmetry to his work and advancing them in his teaching and lecturing. In the years he was active in Boston, 1922-26, he met the Cambridge-based aesthetician and color theorist Denman W. Ross. In adherence to Ross's principles, he adopted a set palette comprising a limited color scale of related tones.
In the years leading up to his retirement in 1934, Giles was dean of the fine arts department of the Master Institute of the Roerich Museum in New York. He then closed his New York studio and moved to Woodstock, Vermont. Thereafter he produced few oils, working mainly in watercolor-as he had throughout his career-and in pastels.
