The first installment of three popped up in and around Washington D.C. in mid-July, the second installment of three appeared along Portland’s waterfront yesterday. They look like life-size gold statues depicting some of President Trump’s most divisive decisions, but in reality they are local performers painted gold and are part of commercial director Bryan Buckley’s Trump Statue Initiative.

Trump Living Statues

Unlike traditional statues, these living art pieces convey a sense of now and urgency. The ironic narratives stand upon makeshift plinths embellished with the name of the piece, followed by Donald Trump, 2016-2020 “Destroyer of Civil Rights and Liberties”

The first installation ‘Now Go Back To School’ (ignoring the advice of the World Health Organization regarding Covid)  ‘The Bunker’ (referring to his cowardice) and ‘The Poser’ (referring to his holding the bible upside down) went up last month around Washington, D.C.

“I noticed that Trump was obsessed with statues,” Buckley told AdAge. “I felt like the best thing we could do was to create these very honest statues of the legacy he’s living right now, that let the world see exactly who he is.”

Today, ‘Ode To Putin’, ‘Some Federal Property We Can Attack’ and ‘I Just Wish Her Well Frankly’ -a reference to his ignorant comment about Ghislaine Maxwell- all appeared in Portland, Oregon.

“We wanted to create these sort of defining moments of his presidency,” Buckley says, “in terms of everything that was wrong.”

Trump Statue Initiative

all images and information courtesy of The Trump Statue Initiative