After spending most of her adult life in the hustle-bustle of the New York metropolitan area, Marguerite Hankins has now achieved a desire to return to her rural roots, both physically and through her nostalgic paintings. She now divides her time between homes in North Carolina and Arizona.

Hankins pursued her love of art and design with life drawing classes while a student at Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri and later at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, where she studied fashion design and painting. After several years as a fashion designer, she married and during the years that she raised her family she kept active in art, primarily in pastel work. In 1999 she became a student of James Childs, noted for his classic mythological themes and as a noted portrait painter in New York City. Marguerite also has studied at Scottsdale Artists' School with Joni Falk, Joseph LoRusso, and Michael Albrechtsen and in North Carolina with Robert Johnson.

Marguerite Hankins is known for her paintings inspired by old photographs and this is her passion. She is challenged by bringing the details of photographs to life, and especially enjoys capturing the fabric and design of old clothing and period costumes and figures in landscape settings. She is a gifted portraitist and captures the character of her subjects through their eyes and weathered faces. Still life painting rounds out her repertoire of favorite things to paint.