Eilise Lancaster (b. 1997) is a painter who specialises in portraiture and narrative paintings.

Growing up in Birmingham afforded Eilise the opportunity to fall under the spell of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, in which she resonated with the longing for another time, and the expression of psychological nuances through gesture, emotion, and storytelling.

Eilise’s interest in oil painting developed further during her studies of art history and fine art, in which she became acquainted with the work of Vigée Le Brun after viewing her portrait of her friend, the Countess Golovine. This portrait showed her the ability of oil painting to render the personality of the sitter, and the power it had to translate the relationship they held with the painter. After studying the works of Bouguereau, Jebusa Shannon, and the academic tradition, she therefore sought out workshops and schools which taught a range of traditional methods, to bolster her largely self-taught practice.

Eilise now works as an artist in residence at a school in London, where she teaches workshops on still life, portrait painting and drawing. Her recent narrative paintings are influenced by poetry and historical costume design.

"‘A portrait, said Watts, should have something in it of the monumental; it is a summary of the life of a person, not the record of accidental position or arrangement of light and shadows.’” - Maas, J. Victorian Painters, (1970) p.219.