Thelma Jean Hillier

Well-known Dublin artist Thelma Jean Hillier, 97, died Sunday, February 9th at Pruitt Health in Toomsboro, GA.  Ms. Hillier was born May 16, 1927, in West Palm Beach, Florida to Dorman Milligan Hillier and Lydia Frances Bath Hillier, both of Twillingate, Newfoundland, Canada.  Before color film was widely available, black and white photographs were colored by hand.  She enjoyed doing this work for friends and family, and her love for art evolved from this hobby. 

Ms. Hillier attended Monteverde Private School in Monteverde, Florida, and graduated from Montreat Private School in North Carolina in 1945.  She studied business at the Virginia State Teachers College in Farmville, Virginia, then graduated from the Terry Art Institute in Miami in 1948 as a commercial artist. While she was working as a legal secretary for Western Electric Company in New York City, the company provided an art instructor who taught lessons in the building after hours for interested employees.  It was in NYC that she met a commercial artist with whom she was married in 1949.

In 1955 she met Kimsey “Mac” Fowler, while he was stationed at Palm Beach AFB, Florida when she took her young niece Debra to a drive-in restaurant.  They found themselves eating next to a car full of Air Force boys, and with no hesitation at all, the four-year old niece struck up a conversation with Mac, and introduced him to Thelma saying, “This is my Aunt Thelma, and she’s divorced!”  Three months later they were married in Hawkinsville, GA where Mac began his career with Georgia Power, and Thelma began work as a shorthand secretary/typist for Hawkinsville attorney Pleasant “Lovejoy” Boyer.  During that time she continued with artwork as a hobby.

When Mac was transferred to the Brunswick office in 1960, Thelma began studying oil painting under art instructor Bill Hendrix at the Island School of Art on St. Simon’s.  In about 1970, she studied silkscreen printing under Mr. Glenn Chestnut at Middle Georgia College.

Ms. Hillier was a multi-talented artist who worked in oils, watercolor, silkscreen printing, etchings, intaglios, pastels, acrylics, charcoal, batiks, woodcuttings, and collagraphs.  Her silkscreen prints were represented by National Art Company in Texas for many years, and consequently, were seen by friends and family members as far away as Los Angeles, Seattle, and Anchorage, Alaska.  Her silkscreen print “Windswept” appeared on the wall of a hospital waiting room in Season 3, Episode 11 of the 1980’s television series Highway to Heaven in about 1983 (now on YouTube).  One of her oil paintings was accidentally on the cover of The Atlanta Journal and Constitution Magazine on May 21, 1967.  She was a longtime member of Gallery 209 on River Street in Savannah as well as the Dublin Art Association.

Ms. Hillier was focused and driven, often beginning work in mid-morning and continuing long into the night.  Working with interior designers, she stayed abreast of evolving color trends in the industry, and used her expert skills at mixing colors she acquired in NYC to satisfy the market demand.  Somehow she still found time to raise three kids, manage an art gallery, run a custom frame shop in Dublin, and travel all over the Southeast selling art and attending art shows.  She won awards at a long list of art competitions all over the Southeast, and was honored with many one-man art shows throughout her career.

Ms. Hillier taught hundreds of students over the years in her home, at her studios, and in summer recreations programs in many communities around Georgia.  By the time her children were in high school, she was traveling so often that they were frequently unaware of where she was or when she would return.  Her son Kimsey once asked his father at dinner one Wednesday evening if mama was around, and was told the she had gone to Atlanta on Monday morning and would be back by the end of the week!

Ms. Hillier not only put in the time and effort to become a great artist, but she made fast work of it too.  She could start and finish an oil painting in a day, do a series of sketches or watercolors in one sitting, or produce a couple hundred silkscreen prints in a few long days of hard work.  The house often smelled of fresh oil paint, and stray paint smears around the house were ubiquitous.  Her family was somewhat plagued by the proliferation of art-making materials and finished works.  They occupied two backyard studios, her galleries, and inside the house, artwork could be found on every wall, standing up behind doors, under the beds, and stacked on any flat surface left exposed and unguarded for more than a few days.  Her kids returning home at the end of a college quarter or summer camp found stacks of art had accumulated in their bedrooms during their absence.  Her son in Seattle claimed to have moved to the other side of the country to escape her artwork, only to find himself 40 years later with her work on every wall in every room of his house!  She was very accomplished at selling around the Southeast.  Of the tens of thousands of pieces of work she produced, what’s left of it now fits in a storage room. 

Plagued with a progressive case of macula degeneration, Ms. Hillier began to have trouble seeing well enough to paint.  By the age of 87 she was occasionally painting skies in shades of green, and signing her work with large letters that she was able to see.  That was 2014, her last year of high productivity.  Subsequently, with great effort, she was only able to dabble in art, but the near complete loss of her vision brought an end to an amazing career that spanned over 70 years.

Her sister Nancy moved up from Florida five years ago, and the two of them lived together nearly independently until mid-November.  A broken hip and covid brought an end to a talented and prolific artist whose work will live on.

Ms. Hillier is survived by a sister, Nancy Anne Hillier Handley; two sons, Kimsey M. Fowler, Jr. of Seattle, and Gary Hillier (Julianne) Fowler of Milledgeville; one daughter, Diane Delores Fowler (Russell) Mitchell; four grandchildren, Michelle Mitchell and Dr. Russell “Paul” Mitchell, Jr. both of Dublin; Macey Marie Fowler of Savannah, and Mitchell “Mitch” Harley Fowler of Milledgeville as well as five great-grandchildren.

Townsend Brothers Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.  The family will receive visitors on Sunday, February 16th, 4-6 PM, and a graveside service will be held at Dublin Memorial Gardens on Monday, February 17th, at 2 PM.  She will be buried next to her former husband Mac Fowler with whom she made peace before his 2012 death.

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