The art of the ancient Egyptians was highly meticulous and methodical, structuring most of the apparatuses and pedagogies that build Coptic iconography as a liturgical system. The art of the Egyptians was highly religious, and was seen as a living art, an art that had power beyond the tangible elements that formed it. Everything conveyed the power of the gods (and Pharaoh, later Eparaou/Eporou) and their union with humanity. The Egyptians sought to secure for themselves eternity in the production of their handiwork, which in and of itself was a very important production. Scribes were the fastest method of social mobility, and only 5-8% of the population could read or write, highlighting the social importance of the visual. The artists were anonymous scribes and required artistic education, and as most of their writing was pictorial, the role of painter and scribe was synonymous, meaning painters were part of the small literate percentage of the population that had to be religiously educated in order to be tasked with educating through painting projects.

A fusion of Pharaonic and Roman funerary practices, the Fayum mummy portraits were portraits of the dead painted in beeswax on wood, often placed above the face of the deceased for recognizability in the afterlife. The images were often idealized and functionally served cultic purposes. They preserved the likeness of the dead for eternity, bringing their presence to life through colour. These portraits idealized the resurrection of the dead and would later serve as templates for panel icons that would arise with the spread of Christianity throughout Egypt, well into the 9th century CE.

By the third century, many themes of Pharaonic art began to be readapted for use by Egypt’s Christians. Isis nursing Horus becomes the Virgin suckling Christ (Maria Lactans), Horus spearing Apophis or Setekh becomes St George slaying the dragon, and the Journey of Ra on his “Atet” (barge) into the sunrise, bringing light to the world, became the bright orange background for icons of Christ, the rising sun, bringing light into the world. The cross replaces the ankh, and Christ sits in Pharaoh’s throne of judgement.

Some of the earliest examples of Christian wall-painting in Egypt can be found in the Necropolis of Al-Bagawat, with frescoes dating to as early as the 3rd century. By the 6th century the vocabulary for iconography is universally developed, and consistency begins to be seen in the themes that bring the walls of monasteries and churches to life throughout Christendom. In a bustling monastery in Bawit, the cells of monks and the walls of churches are painted with beautiful examples of the zenith of Coptic art between the 6th to 8th centuries.

Between the 8th and 10th centuries, the Monastery of the Syrians launched several iconographic programs in which an intricate melange of Coptic, Syrian and Byzantine iconographies came into play. These programs would later be plastered over, with few paintings being executed between the tenth and thirteenth centuries.

The Monastery of St Anthony by the Red Sea in Egypt consists of one of the most complete programs of iconography (largely painted by Theodore the "writer of life") that mark the style of iconography in Medieval Egypt. Immediately noticeable are the many commonalities that appear between the metalwork, illuminated manuscripts, and calligraphic texts of the Ayyubids and the Medieval Islamic art of the north African region. It appears in the attire, line work, compositions and colour palettes used in painting the Coptic equestrian martyrs and ascetics that adorn the walls of the church of St Anthony. The frescoes are unique for their seamless synergy of distinct artistic traditions and depictions of two religions, political positions, and origins in terms of indigeneity. These intersections of style appear in the everyday objects of Medieval Egypt and continue into the work of the Armenian artists who will aim to revive iconography in Ottoman Egypt several centuries later. Similar wall paintings appear to exist (undoubtedly once of the same caliber as St Anthony's) in old Cairo and throughout the monasteries of Wadi el Natrun.

After a few centuries of virtually no iconographic tradition, 18th century Coptic Egypt witnessed an iconographic revival under the hands of Yuhanna Al-Armani and Ibrahim Al Nasikh, two iconographers of foreign origins who worked in a large cosmopolitan studio, where disciples and teachers divided and conquered a mass production of what would result in over 400 icons in a fifty-year span. These icons adorned most of the churches of Old Cairo, and reinstated the use of icons in the church as liturgical objects. As described by Zuzana Skalova, the icons of Yuhanna and Ibrahim may initially seem to be inexperienced attempts at Byzantine iconography. However, upon closer inspection the introduction of new elements previously unseen and the firm adhesion to certain canons from Coptic antiquity indicate that they not only studied, but reproduced designs and details from Medieval and Antique Coptic Art.

The colonization of Egypt under the French and the British saw an influx of Protestant and Catholic missionaries who imported Western religious imagery into Coptic churches throughout Egypt. The lack of availability of any transmission of Coptic iconographic tradition led to the use of such imagery in churches in place of traditional Orthodox icons. Eurocentric and colonial attitudes largely informed preferences for the imagery used in Coptic churches, and continues to this day.

With the Contemporary Egyptian art movement during the Egyptian renaissance (nahda) of the early 20th century, several Copts made diligent attempts to produce authentic Coptic work for churches arising in the period. Most notable were Ragheb Ayad, Marguerite Nakhla, and Ramses Wissa Wassef. Although their work was not structured by any theological or iconographic canons, their work emphasized the indigeneity of the ethnoreligious Coptic minority population whilst attempting to dilute all notions of Euro-centrism and colonialism. They implemented a Pharaonic visual system in their attempts at iconographic stylization or, “culturalization.” These efforts would later influence the work of the late Dr Isaac Fanous and his counterparts, Bedour Latif and Youssef Nassief, the founding faculty of the arts department of the Higher Institute of Coptic Studies (HICS) in 1960.

In the 1950s, Fanous was tasked by Pope Kyrillos the sixth to revive, reform, and standardize the iconography of the Coptic church. He was appointed chair of the art department of HICS in 1960, and in 1965 he received a scholarship from the Louvre to study restoration and iconography in Paris, largely under the renowned Leonid Ouspensky and Paul Evdokimov, who he would spend 2 years with. Upon his return to Cairo, Fanous launched a series of iconographic programs in Alexandria and Cairo. His work sought to strictly reflect the Biblical and liturgical theological language of the Church, whilst using Pharaonic art as a vehicle for that expression. He voided his work of any foreign influences, seeking to reform iconography into something that reflected the deep spirituality of the Pharaohs fulfilled by the boom of Christianity in Egypt under the its church fathers. He facilitated the visual Pharaonic language by infusing contemporary artistic influences in his work that reinforced the ideals of iconography, namely cubism. Cubism was fundamentally controversial as it revisited the basic principles of “Western” art, bringing into consideration the rising popularity of African and non-Western art. In Pharaonic painting, each object, figure or entity is isolated, suspended as an autonomously composition subject and free-standing. Overlap is minimal and each visual component is seen from a single confrontational perspective- similar to cubism, all angles of a particular person or thing are presented from one vantage point. Thus the icon, through the use of these visual methods, highlighted the important focal points, transfigured by the use of light, and bringing the viewer into full communion with every inch of the icon before them.

Between 1960 and 2002, Fanous would proceed to paint thousands of icons for over 40 churches in Egypt, England, Canada, the US, and France, training several disciples who continue to work until this day. In 1988 the first PhD thesis on iconography was written by Dr Jaqueline Ascott, followed by a second in 1990 by Dr Stephane Rene. Among his disciples are also Seham Guirguis, Guirguis Boktor, Ashraf Fayek, Mary Guirguis, Martha Ghaly, and Fadi Mikhail. Fanous’ oeuvre reached its zenith in the Churches of the Virgin Mary in Ard el Goelf (1988) and Pasadena (1995). Throughout his career he systematically aimed to build a heavily researched and consulted structure with which the icon is produced, a structure used by most of his disciples today. Coptic art is inextricably linked to Coptic identity, and thus a church reflects its identity and theology with the icons it uses.