Keight MacLean is a Toronto-based painter, born and raised in Kingston, Ontario. MacLean is an OCAD University graduate and alumna of the school’s revered Florence Program, in Florence, Italy. 

Inspired by her time studying the old masters first hand, MacLean’s paintings combine the old with the new, reproducing historical portraits by hand before applying contemporary and experimental methods such as fluorescent spray paint, re-harvested artists’ mediums and destructive techniques.


With a love for European history, MacLean’s focus on women was born after years of reading male driven histories. Her work now seeks to celebrate the many women in historical portraits, either without name, known only in reference to their male relations or entirely unknown, giving a voice to the silenced.

More recently, Keight MacLean’s painting practice is inspired by history and both driven by and at odds with personal health struggles. MacLean’s paintings start as skillful reproductions of Old Masters portraits on wood but are purposefully defaced, aged and adorned with gold, invoking the passage of time. Classically beautiful faces peek out from behind built up dirt, dripping spray paint, cracking surfaces, scratching and layers of paint. With the trappings of the Old Masters, MacLean’s work calls on the persistence of historical objects to mirror the relationship we have with our bodies in the face of chronic illness, wear and deterioration.