James McGrath is a painter and digital artist whose practice sits at the intersection of Baroque spatial theory, architectural design, and environmental data. Born in Sydney in 1969, he trained at the University of New South Wales (M.Arch, First Class Honours) and the Architectural Association in London, following early studio assistantships under Patrick Betaudier in Paris and Arthur Boyd at Bundanon.

McGrath constructs virtual 3D stages—monastic libraries, miniature teatrini, mirrored interiors, and simulated drapery—before translating them into multi-layered oil on canvas. Begun in 2010 following privileged drawing access to the Strahov Monastic Library in Prague, his ongoing Ex Libris series operates as a multi-year reconstruction of historic archives, placing living creatures against bone-white vellum bindings.

A parallel digital practice extends these spatial investigations into time-based and environmental art. Co-founding the collective Nature as Data, McGrath transforms 3D LiDAR laser scans of threatened ecosystems into large-scale public installations, including Ghost Trees (The LUME Melbourne, NFSA Canberra, Detroit Institute of Arts) and The Children’s Tree.

His recent body of work, On Loan (developed for the Encounters section at London Art Fair 2027), synthesises these threads. Staging 3D scans of thoroughbreds within digital box-theatres before executing them in oil, the series removes the human sitters to subvert traditional sporting art—proposing that while human authority and title are fleeting, the animal and the natural world remain permanent, held merely on loan.