Painter and draughtsman of literary portraits and still lifes, born in Dublin, Ireland. His father, Senator Edward A McGuire, also painted. After time at Downside, the Roman Catholic public school near Bath, McGuire travelled in France and Italy where he studied the early masters, spent time in the studio of Pietro Annigoni and in 1952–3 attended Rome’s Academy of Fine Art. After a brief experience of business in Dublin McGuire studied at the Slade School of Fine Art, 1954–5, Lucian Freud an influential teacher. Other influences were the Irish artist Patrick Tuohy and Belgian Surrealist René Magritte. Returned to Ireland, where he briefly painted as Edward Augustine; developed an interest in poetry, painting a first portrait of a poet, Patrick Kavanagh, in 1961; settled in Sandycove, Dun Laoghaire; and in 1970 appeared at the David Hendriks Gallery as a designer for Claddagh Records.