By Brett Johnson

For Ethiopian-born artist Julie Mehretu, size really does matter. Her biggest painting, 23 feet tall by 80 feet long, hangs in the lobby of the Goldman Sachs building in lower Manhattan. The piece, simply titled “Mural,” has the art world abuzz in part due to its large scale, but also because of its $5 million price tag and the company that commissioned it in 2007—admittedly long before last year’s economic crisis—to complete the project.

Mehretu, 39, who lives in Harlem with her partner, Jessica Rankin, also an artist, and their 5-year-old son, says she tries not to let her association with the much-maligned investment bank bother her. “I really don’t see Goldman Sachs as an evil institution,” she says. “There are some systemic problems in terms of government and oversight and issues like that—but my interest is in the art, the painting, and this possibility.”