President Donald Trump is asking for a do over. The White House says he wants a new painting to stand beside the usual row of presidential portraits in the national collection. This is not common, but then again, he is not a common case.
Presidential tradition is simple. Since George Washington, each president gets an official portrait that joins the others after the president has fully left office. The rules are meant to keep the gallery a record of finished histories, not ongoing campaigns.
The portrait at the center of this fuss was painted by Ronald Sherr. He completed it after the 45th term and before he died in 2022. The picture shows Mr. Trump at a rally with the White House in the background, if you prefer your presidential art with a soundtrack.
Then came the plot twist. Mr. Trump announced a new run for the job and never really left. That made the timing awkward for the museum that cares for those portraits. The National Portrait Gallery does not usually hang a presidential painting while the subject might return to the job. So the Sherr portrait sat waiting, like evening clothes for a party that might not happen.
The White House put it plainly in a statement. βPresident Trump was appreciative of the portrait created for his 45th term and looks forward to seeing the completion of a portrait that will encapsulate both his 45th and 47th presidential terms,β White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said. That is as neat a way as any to ask for a second official likeness.
Sherrβs widow, Lois Sherr, described her late husbandβs work in warm words that artists tend to use when asked to praise a portrait. βWhat sets this portrait by Ron apart is that he captured Trumpβs movement, energy, and feeling of absolute resolve,β she said.
The gallery that would host an official presidential portrait is the National Portrait Gallery. For now it says it had not been asked to commission a new painting. Museum staff reminded reporters that paintings usually arrive after a president has left for good, which keeps the exhibit from turning into a campaign stop.
This moment sits inside a bigger story about how museums and the public record are handled these days. The Smithsonian Institution oversees the portrait gallery and has been pulled into debates over how history is told and who decides what to show. Those fights make an official portrait more than a picture on a wall. They make it a statement.
The galleryβs backlog also includes the portrait of Joe Biden which, like many modern presidential pictures, waited for its big reveal. Recent presidents have chosen artists who shake up the old look. Kehinde Wiley and Chuck Close gave their subjects a very different sense of style and caused plenty of conversation about taste and authority. Art choices can start debates that last decades.
So what happens next is mostly procedure with a dash of rhetoric. If the gallery does not want a second portrait, it can say so. If the White House wants a new painting, it can ask for one and wait for the usual formal steps. Meanwhile the first portrait remains a quiet awkward guest in the wings. It is a reminder that even in a place that shows history, timing matters.
Featured image via The Daily Glitch library
