Peter Pearson is an American icon painter, author, and teacher of iconography. He has created hundreds of icons for private collectors, churches, and other institutions throughout the world. Through his workshops and seminars, he has worked with more than 2,500 students.
He began painting icons at the age of twelve and has studied under Russian icon painter Dr. Nina Bouroff in Bethesda, Maryland and Philip Zimmerman at the St. John of Damascus School of Sacred Arts, an Orthodox school of icon painting in Ligonier, Pennsylvania. He also trained with Valentin Streltsov of Toronto, Ontario, Nicholas Papas in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Father Damian Higgins at The Sisters of Saint Basil Monastery, Fox Chase, Pennsylvania, Xenia Pokrovshy at Saint Tikhon's Monastery in South Canaan, Pennsylvania and at the Iconography Institute at Mount Angel Abbey in Oregon, where he studied with Charles Rohrbacher of Juneau, Alaska.
Pearson also studied architectural drafting and color at the International Institute of Design in Washington, D.C., and theology, with a specialization in liturgical studies, at Saint John’s Seminary in Boston, Georgetown University, and at Saint Vincent Seminary in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, where he graduated magna cum laude, completing a Master of Divinity degree in 1995. His course work included specialized studies on the history of church architecture and liturgical vesture, the role of art in worship, as well as a full year on liturgical consultation. He is presently pursuing a doctorate in theology at the Providence School of Theology focusing on the relationship between liturgy and architecture.
A former Benedictine monk, Pearson is a member of the Community of Solitude, an ecumenical monastic community. Ordained in 1996, he serves as the priest/rector at St. Philip's Church in New Hope, Pennsylvania and the dean of Bucks County in the Diocese of Pennsylvania (Episcopal Church).