ABOUT THE ARTIST
EILEEN McGUCKIN was born in Bolton, Lancashire in 1946, and grew up in Northern England where she became an art student qualifying from the University of Newcastle on Tyne, at St. Mary’s college, Fenham, and subsequently taught Fine Art to adults and children in the course of an educational career that lasted over thirty years, the last years of which saw her as head-teacher in two schools: Barton Stacey CofE Primary in Hampshire, and Lady Elizabeth Hastings CofE Primary in Ledston, Yorkshire. From the 1970’s onwards she concentrated on English landscape painting in gouache, watercolor, oils and acrylics, and had many successful exhibitions in this style. As well as landscapes she occasionally undertook official portraits of military and academic figures in Britain. From 1979 onwards she began to study and practise iconographic painting, and in 1993 she received the official blessing of the Romanian Orthodox hierarch H.E. Serafim Joanta, to be an ecclesiastical Icon-Painter in the Eastern Christian traditions of art (Byzantine and Slavonic Iconography). Since 1995 this has become the main focus of her work. She came to New York in 1997 and opened the Icon Studio on Broadway in Manhattan, serving as her workshop and permanent gallery. Since then she has become much sought-after as a Church painter, and worked full-time as a professional iconographer, undertaking private commissions for individuals, as well as for institutions in the United States and Europe. Her work can be found not only in Orthodox, but also in Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, and Episcopalian churches and private homes in the United States and in Europe. Reproductions of her icons can be found in several gift shops. Her iconographic work has also featured in, and on the covers of many academic books issued by publishers in Europe and America, such as Oxford Univeristy Press, and T&T Clark, and others. The originals of her icon panels range from small pieces for the home, typically 14 by 11 inches on wood, to much larger ‘Church-size’ panels, up to six feet in height. In 2017 Eileen retired back to England where she is the Preotasa of the small Orthodox community of St. Gregory’s in the coastal town of St. Annes on the Sea, Lancashire.
To contact the Artist please email to: jamcguckin@gmail.com