Cecil Maguire was born in Lurgan, Co. Armagh in 1930 and graduated from Queen's University Belfast in 1951. Following a career as Senior English Master in Lurgan College, Maguire retired in 1981 to concentrate on painting full time. Prior to this decision he became an associate of the Royal Ulster Academy in 1967 and began exhibiting at the RHA in 1971. From 1982 to 1992 he exhibited at the Oriel Gallery in Dublin in a series od solo exhibitions. Cecil Maguire now lives and works for a great part of the year in Roundstone, Co. Galway, where he feels very much at home in an area of tranquility and ever changing landscape, His work is part of many public, private and major national colections including The National Self Portrait Collection and The Ulster Museum and The United Nations Headquarters in New York