Greta McLain was born in 1984 in Minneapolis, MN. Attended and then graduated from the University of California Davis with a visual art degree. In California she worked primarily with silkscreen artist and muralist Malaqu’as Montoya, focusing her studies on Chicano art and its art traditions of mural and printmaking. While in school, ignited by an unspeakably huge affiliation and illation at her discovery of cooperative community art and drawn to the strong line, color and passion of Mexican murals, she spent a semester in Mexico City studying at la Escuela Nacional de Artes Pl‡sticas. While in Mˇxico City she also discovered and immersed herself in the tradition of Posada and his woodcut prints, discovering another outlet for her love of line.
In her paintings and prints, Greta works to integrate her strong line with her longing for color. While maintaining as her primary focus the strength and responsibility of working in the visual language, focusing on social themes of immigration, gender issues and the strength of the heart and power of self-forgiveness.
Murals to McLain represent everything that art should be: an integration of art and beauty, community building and social activism. Her murals draw from the artistic roots of the Tres Grandes Muralistas from Mˇxico, and the social application of that tradition in the Chicano style stemming from the Chicano movement of the 60s and 70s in the US. McLain hopes to continue her journey of self and artistic discovery, using muralism as a means of sharing with and drawing from her community.
Greta McLain is a charismatic, community artist with a strong sense of her roots and the artistic roots that she is inspired by. For McLain art is all about loving and giving back to those that inspire that love. Luz y amor!
Greta is currently available for mural and canvas commissions, and collaboration (please see the contact page).
