Blog / 2025 / Presidential Portraits

Three portraits of Trump have been in the news recently and they each show a different side of POTUS, though not because the artists managed to bring out anything new about the man. Rather, the revealing part is in Trump’s reactions: there’s the painting he hates, the one he loves, and the one he has to love.

This is the one he loathes. In 2019, Colorado Republicans raised over $10k on GoFundMe in order to commission Sarah Boardman to paint this piece, and it had been on display in the Denver Capitol Building for six years before Trump called it “purposefully distorted” and “truly the worst” on his social media platform in January. In response, state lawmakers quashed their own free speech, removing the portrait from the wall.

Compare Boardman’s art to this portrait, the one Trump likes well enough to hang in the White House. It’s in a spot usually reserved for the portrait of the last president. Since Biden’s official likeness isn’t ready yet, it was Obama’s that the White House had to move in order to make room for this straightforward recreation of photojournalist Evan Vucci’s famous image of the moment after the July assassination attempt in Pennsylvania.

Displaying this painting is unusual not just for its location, but also because sitting presidents don’t normally hang paintings of themselves in the People’s House, since it creeps a little too close to “Dear Leader” territory for most Commanders-in-Chief.

Still, I think the thing that disturbs me most about this painting is that there’s no artist credited, either on the White House’s social media or in press coverage of the story. That too smacks of authoritarian rule, along the lines of Soviet artists during Stalin’s reign. The USSR sanctioned only one kind of art, socialist realism. This type of imagery always glorifies the leader and depicts how great things are going, and it’s heavy on optimism, while also being light on creativity or individual flare.

And speaking of, this is the painting that Trump has to love. It’s by Russian artist Nikas Safronov, and it was commissioned by the Kremlin as a gift for POTUS. In this case, the artist has altered Vucci’s image a bit, bringing in the Statue of Liberty to echo Trump’s raised fist and showing him holding a red baseball hat by its bill in an awkwardly placed left hand.

This gift happened in March, but we didn’t get to see the portrait itself until the 22^nd of April. That’s eleven days after the White House announced the installation of the more direct rip-off of Vucci’s image by an uncredited artist. It was also right as talks between American, Ukrainian, and European officials about ending the conflict in Ukraine were stalling, because Trump is insisting that the victims give Putin everything he wants.

POTUS didn’t share this portrait with the public. Instead the Russian painter gave an exclusive interview to CNN, explaining that he didn’t initially know for sure that the Kremlin was behind the commission, but he guessed it was, and that was later confirmed when Putin himself reached out.

The present-day socialist realist artist added: “when I started the portrait, I realized this could bring our countries closer, and decided not to charge any money because I suspected what this painting was for.”

I wonder where Safronov’s portrait will end up being displayed. Or will Trump only put it out when he knows Putin will be over for dinner?

All of which brings me to this image. It’s part of a larger painting I made in 2018 depicting the many cruel people who assisted Trump Part 1. I’ve cut out the majority of the painting, focusing on this detail so it’s just a portrait of Trump with Putin on the tip of his tongue.

Please use this digital image as you like. You can buy t-shirts and stickers of the Trump-Putin double portrait as well as posters of other protest art in my print shop.