Illustrator, painter, muralist. Born in St Paul, MN on July 16, 1898. Hiler was educated at the University of Pennsylvania, University of Denver, Golden State University in Los Angeles, and the Nat’l College in Ontario, Canada. Sailing to France in 1919, he continued at the University of Paris while playing saxophone in a jazz band. During the 1920’s he ran the Jockey Club (an artists’ hangout) on the Left Bank. At the club he often played jazz piano with a live monkey on his back. Upon moving to San Francisco in the 1930’s, he was commissioned by the WPA to paint murals in the Aquatic Park Bath House (now the Nat’l Maritime Museum). He contributed illustrated maps for the GGIE of 1939 and exhibited at the fair. From San Francisco he moved to Hollywood where he opened a short-lived nightclub on the Sunset Strip. He then lived in Santa Fe, NYC, and in the early 1960’s returned to Paris where he remained until his death on Jan. 19, 1966. A self-taught artist, he was an exponent of modern art and known for his abstract works.
