Michael Craig-Martin was born in Dublin, but spent most of his childhood in Washington, D.C. For eight years he attended a Roman Catholic school which was run by nuns, followed by the English Benedictine Priory School (now St. Anselm's Abbey School), where pupils were encouraged to look at religious imagery in illuminated glass panels and stained-glass windows. He gained an interest in art through one of the priests, who was an artist, and was also strongly impressed by a display in the Phillips Collection of work by Mark Rothko.