Behind the painting depicting Trump sharing drinks with GOP presidents
The painting shows a slim Trump enjoying a laugh with other GOP presidents.
A painting of President Donald Trump enjoying drinks at a table with other famous Republican presidents has taken the internet by storm.
The reaction, including snark comments, started when a screengrab showing the painting hanging in the White House blew up on Twitter on Sunday evening when the CBS program “60 Minutes” tweeted out a preview of its interview with the president.
The painting shows Trump, noticeably slim some might say, in a bar scene surrounded by Republican presidents, including Abraham Lincoln, Richard Nixon, George W. Bush, Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan and Theodore Roosevelt.
The Missouri painter, Andy Thomas, has done political works in the past. The painting, titled, “The Republican Club,” is just one in a series of presidential paintings. He’s previously painted Republican presidents playing poker and other Democratic presidents, including Barack Obama, playing pool, according to his website.
Thomas told the Daily Beast that California GOP Rep. Darren Issa, a fan of Thomas’ work, gave the print to Trump. Although Thomas has painted many political figures in the past, it’s his first painting of Trump, according to the Daily Beast.
Thomas told the Washington Post that Trump called him and complimented the painting, saying he’d seen a lot of paintings of himself and normally doesn’t find them flattering. Thomas told the Post that he wants to make everyone as good-looking as he can and tries to “shed the pounds where I need to. Or smooth some lines.” He also said he seeks out happy pictures to model the faces after in his paintings.
He told the Post that he depicted Trump drinking a Diet Coke after doing research.
Efforts by ABC News to reach Thomas for comment were unsuccessful.
The work also features a woman’s figure looming in the background. That same woman, according to an interview with Time Magazine earlier this year, appears in a similarly styled painting of Obama and other Democratic presidents. Thomas told Time in May that the indistinct figure is the first female Republican or Democratic president approaching the table.
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