Driven by a desire to create atmosphere rather than tell stories, McGinley seeks to make the ephemeral tangible.
Abigail McGinley conceives painting as the most direct means of communicating her ideas, using pigment as a vessel for feeling. A firm believer in the autonomy of painting, she employs imagery to convey meaning independently of contextualisation. The result is a body of work linked by aesthetics and atmosphere rather than narrative. Central to her practice is the relationship between the materiality of paint and her chosen subject matter, from languid figures and moody interiors to abstracted landscapes. Working with muted, earthy tones on unprimed linen, she explores the tension between concealment and revelation, allowing pigment to stain and absorb into the surface.
Her visual world centres on the body and what it means to inhabit one. Driven by a desire to create atmosphere rather than tell stories, McGinley seeks to make the ephemeral tangible, capturing the emotional and sensory qualities of experience. Her figures become vessels for sensation, occupying an ambiguous space between reality and imagination, waking and dreaming. Through the sensuality of her compositions, she invites viewers to engage with the work on an instinctive and emotional level.
McGinley's recent exhibitions include All That's Left Behind (2026), Florence Trust, London; Behind the Curtains (2026) and A Boy Falling Out of the Sky (2025), Soho Revue, London; and her solo exhibition I See You, Do You See Me? (2024), LKIF Gallery, Seoul. She has also exhibited at Gillian Jason Gallery, London, in Hysteria (2023) and Face to Face (2022), and completed residencies at Soho Revue, London (2025), and Gillian Jason Gallery, Milan (2022).