"A portrait is a picture in which there is just a tiny little something not quite right about the mouth." -- John Singer Sargent

Monday, January 16, 2017

Donald J. Trump

 


This 1989 photo of Donald J. Trump (born NY City, 1946) by Michael O'Brian hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC.
"On November 8, 2016, real estate magnate, businessman, and reality television star Donald J. Trump completed a stunning rise to the presidency by defeating Hillary Rodham Clinton after one of the most volatile and divisive campaigns in recent memory. Tapping into a deep vein of populist American sentiment, Trump became the first non-politician to win the presidency since Dwight D, Eisenhower. He had earlier garnered the Republican nomination, to the surprise of that party's establishment figures.

Trump made his fortune in New York City rear estate and then expanded his empire into airline, casino, and hotel ventures both in America and abroad. This photograph which was also the cover for his second book, Trump: Surviving at the Top (1990) shows the brash businessman tossing an apple into the air, advertising his role in New York City's property boom of the late 1980s. Never short on confidence, Trump leveraged his business career through the media to create the persona that launched his political career. "-- National Portrait Gallery
Inauguration 2017
Donald J. Trump

The O'Brian photo of Donald Trump was given to the Gallery in 2011 by Bill and Sally Wittliff. See this NPR article.

The sticker below on a sign in a Washington Metro station reflects the view of J20 Counter-Inauguration Protests in the days leading up to the inauguration.


Updates:

On Dec. 14, 2022, ex-president Donald J. Trump foreshadowed a major announcement.



The announcement initiated the sale of Trump trading-cards in the form of Non-Fungible Tokens which sold for $99 each. 



2023

When Trump claimed that he would be arrested on Tuesday March 21, 2023, AI-generated fake photos of Trump being arrested appeared on the internet: (see Mediaite)

Fake arrest photos

A Washington Post headline read “Fake images of Trump arrest show ‘giant step’ for AI’s disruptive power.”   The images were generated  by journalist Eliot Higgins using a program called Midjourney. According to Mediaite,  “The photos vary in quality and subject matter, and according to KnowYourMeme originated Saturday {March 18} with a now-deleted thread by a user named @TheInfiniteDude that included a Trump mug shot:” 

Fake Trump Mugshot

When former president Trump was indicted for falsifying business records in New York, on April 4, 2023, no mugshots were released.

An actual mugshot appeared when Donald Trump surrendered to authorities in Fulton County Georgia on August 24, 2023. (See  The Washington Post)


Trump promptly published this on Twitter (er... X). 


Courtroom sketch artist Jane Rosenberg made this, now famous, representation of Trump's April 4, 2023 arraignment in New York:


Which appeared on the April 17 cover of The New Yorker:


Rosenberg told  Hakim Bishara,  “Trump is really fun to draw,” ... “He’s got tons of expression on his face and that crazy hair that is almost like a hat.”...“I’m not saying it’s a happy or pleasant face, but he has a unique look that is fun to capture.”


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