Bonnie MacLean
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Bonnie MacLean (December 28, 1939  – February 4, 2020), also known as Bonnie MacLean Graham, was an American artist known for her classic rock posters. In the 1960s and 1970s she created posters and other art for the promotion of
rock and roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock-n-roll, and rock 'n' roll) is a Genre (music), genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It Origins of rock and roll, originated from African ...
concerts managed by Bill Graham, using the iconic psychedelic art style of the day. MacLean continued her art as a painter focusing mostly on nudes,
still life A still life (: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, human-m ...
s, and
landscape A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or human-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes th ...
s. Her work has been placed alongside the "big five"—male Haight-Ashbury poster artists who were seminal to the "iconography of the counterculture scene."


Early life

Bonnie MacLean was born on December 28, 1939, in
Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
, and grew up in nearby
Trenton, New Jersey Trenton is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County, New Jersey, Mercer County. It was the federal capital, capital of the United States from November 1 until D ...
. She graduated from
Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsyl ...
in 1961 with a degree in French. She moved to New York after graduating college, where she worked at the Pratt Institute and took drawing classes in the evenings. MacLean moved to San Francisco in 1963, where she met Bill Graham who had been her boss at her office job at Allis-Chalmers. Throughout her life MacLean continued to study art, taking courses at the Academy of Art University, the San Francisco Art Institute, and the California College of Arts and Crafts.


Fillmore posters

Artist Wes Wilson was the main poster artist for The Fillmore when he and Bill Graham had a "falling out" and Wilson quit. MacLean had been painting noticeboards at the auditorium in the psychedelic style, and took up the creation of the posters after Wilson left, creating more than thirty posters, most in 1967. Some of her posters have been sold for $10,000, and are highly valued in the collectors' market. Using boards, her concert posters were "vivid, hand-drawn bills" in an
Art Nouveau Art Nouveau ( ; ; ), Jugendstil and Sezessionstil in German, is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and ...
style. She developed her own motif, with "elaborate plumes, curving letters and stoic faces." MacLean's style was inspired by imagery of the Medieval Gothic era, such as circular stained glass windows and pointed arches. During her four-year run at the Fillmore, she rendered posters for Jefferson Airplane,
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,
Jimi Hendrix James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (born Johnny Allen Hendrix; November 27, 1942September 18, 1970) was an American singer-songwriter and musician. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential guitarists of all time. Inducted ...
,
Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin were an English rock music, rock band formed in London in 1968. The band comprised vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist-keyboardist John Paul Jones (musician), John Paul Jones and drummer John Bonham. With a he ...
,
Pink Floyd Pink Floyd are an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1965. Gaining an early following as one of the first British psychedelic music, psychedelic groups, they were distinguished by their extended compositions, sonic experiments ...
,
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,
The Allman Brothers Band The Allman Brothers Band was an American rock music, rock band formed in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1969. Its founding members were brothers Duane Allman (slide guitar, lead guitar) and Gregg Allman (vocals, keyboards), as well as Dickey Betts ( ...
,
The Doors The Doors were an American rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1965, comprising vocalist Jim Morrison, keyboardist Ray Manzarek, guitarist Robby Krieger and drummer John Densmore. They were among the most influential and controversial rock acts ...
,
The Who The Who are an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1964. Their classic lineup (1964–1978) consisted of lead vocalist Roger Daltrey, guitarist Pete Townshend, bassist John Entwistle and drummer Keith Moon. Considered one of th ...
, and The Yardbirds. Getting concert attendance was her first goal. As she told the '' Bucks County Courier Times'', "I could do what I wanted, but the object was for people to notice the poster and hopefully come out." She was a "driving force" in the San Francisco rock music scene, and her posters were instrumental in promoting The Fillmore Auditorium's success. The ''Summer of Love: Art of the Psychedelic Era"'' exhibition began in 2005 at the Tate Liverpool, and in 2007 the exhibition traveled to the Whitney Museum of American Art which showcased her posters. Her favorite poster was "BG #75" which displays an orange and blue color peacock and its elaborate tail with white and green accents around a human face. Next to it were the names of famous bands all scheduled to perform at The Fillmore in San Francisco – the Yardbirds, the James Cotton Blues Band, Richie Havens and the Doors. In 2015, she reprised her earlier work to commemorate the opening of the Philadelphia Fillmore. Her posters are iconic. MacLean's posters are included in many museum collections including at the
Brooklyn Museum The Brooklyn Museum is an art museum in the New York City borough (New York City), borough of Brooklyn. At , the museum is New York City's second largest and contains an art collection with around 500,000 objects. Located near the Prospect Heig ...
, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco collection and at the De Young Museum, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among others. MacLean's artwork was a part of the 2013–2014 exhibition, ''Designing Modern Women 1890–1990'' at the
Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...
in New York City.


Personal life

MacLean and Bill Graham married on June 11, 1967. They had one child, David Wolodia Graham, born in 1968. MacLean and Graham eventually separated, after sustaining many strains on their relationship, such as Graham's extramarital affairs and missing of their son's birth. After several years of separation, they divorced in 1975. MacLean returned to Pennsylvania in 1972. In 1981, she married painter Jacques Fabert (1925–2013), who she'd met in 1971 when he was her art teacher. She lived in rural
Bucks County, Pennsylvania Bucks County is a County (United States), county in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 646,538, making it the List of counties in Pennsylvania, four ...
. MacLean died on February 4, 2020, at age 80, at the Buckingham Valley Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Newtown, Pennsylvania. No cause of death was reported.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:MacLean, Bonnie 1939 births 2020 deaths Artists from Philadelphia Artists from Bucks County, Pennsylvania Psychedelic artists Pennsylvania State University alumni American poster artists Pratt Institute faculty