Kamay 22A, Aruba north

Abi Joy Samuel

Kunstenaar

Abi has the remarkable ability to capture the most intimate details of her subject’s expressions.

Abi (based in London, born in 1993) is a representational painter influenced by abstract expressionism, working in mainly oils and high gloss paint. The foundation for her work starts at the time of her birth, when her father left the family, leaving her mother in a state of mental decline. With no one to take Abi in, she was put into foster care. Through painting, Abi seeks to unravel the past, and come to terms with trauma, neglect and abuse, whilst expressing the complex way in which her experiences shaped her character, particularly her sexuality. By allowing the shapes and colours on the canvas to dictate the direction of the work, Abi is able to access the unconscious part of her mind, revealing images from her early years.

Abi Joy Samuel is an emerging full-time artist. She is a part of an art collective based in East London with artist’s Henrik Uldalen and Tiffany Cole. Her practice evolves around large scale oil-painted portraits focusing on her gender and sexuality.

Having taken her Art And Design foundation at the prestigious Central Saint Martins and later obtaining a degree in Fashion Design at the University of Westminster, Abi has a wealth of artistic training and experience that merges fine art with fashion to explore human experience.

Abi has worked for some very influential fashion brands including McQ Alexander McQueen (London), Manish Arora (New Delhi) and Aganovich (Paris).

Since graduating in 2017, Abi has studied portraiture and anatomy at Hampstead School of Art and Heatherley’s School of Fine Art, run workshops at the Victoria and Albert Museum, completed a 5 week artist residency in the mountains of India and debuted as a solo artist December 2018 with an almost sell out show. One of Abi’s most recent patrons is an art critic for the New York Times.

Her most recent achievements include winning the ‘Lexus Prize’ at the Hampstead Art Fair 2019. Abi has just finished her next solo exhibition titled ‘Piety & Sex’ featuring almost 60 drawings and paintings produced over the last 2 years years.