Emily Pavlovic Chiles' Biography

Emily Chiles Startz (aka EP Chiles) is a native Texan, who spent her early years in Midland, Texas participating in The Midland Community Theatre as an actress, set builder, and costume sewer, before obtaining her degree in Theatre from Skidmore College. Her entry into the artworld began when she painted large canvases (flats) used in stage plays. Imagine a child painting a 6 x 10-foot canvas. One uses housepaint brushes to paint in large figure-eights. Then one spatters different colors of paint on the flat to provide texture for the stage lighting. Abstract painting was the logical step to express her creative self.

After retiring from the corporate world in Houston, she took art classes at Art League – Houston, under the tutelage of Steve Parker. Here she learned to paint beautiful landscapes with oil paints. As a former Girl Scout, she loved painting outside, too. She has a large collection of her plein air paints.

Her current show at The Woodlands Art Gallery & Studios includes her early abstracts, which have never been offered to the public, and her powerful new abstracts. Some of her landscape paintings are also on display.