What If Every Painting Had to Feature Donald Trump?

26 Aug 2026 · 2 min

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In this satirical monologue, TJ Walker riffs on Donald Trump’s penchant for plastering his name and likeness on public objects— from passports to airports— and imagines a whimsical edict that would require all American artwork to feature Trump, mirroring historical mandates that forced artists to depict religious subjects. He draws parallels to the Middle Ages and the Roman Empire, noting how medieval European art was dominated by images of the baby Jesus and the Madonna, citing the Cloisters museum in Manhattan as a modern showcase of that era’s iconography. Walker argues, tongue‑in‑cheek, that if such enforced imagery helped make Europe great, a Trump‑centric visual mandate could similarly “make America great,” using humor and irony to critique the cult of personality surrounding the former president.

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I think that given the fact that Donald Trump has put his name on everything, his face on passports, his name on the airport that's 15 miles away from my house, given his propensity for liking his name and face on everything, why stop there? From now on, why don't we take a page— after all, this is supposedly a Christian nation, right? Why don't we take a page From the good old days, you know, the Middle Ages. Why don't we do like the Roman Empire did? Have a nice stretch. Let's have a few hundred years. Remember that time all the artwork had to show the baby Jesus and Madonna in a very favorable light? You want to see some of that? Go to the Cloisters Park at the very tippy top North end of Manhattan, and you're going to see baby Jesus, baby Jesus, baby Jesus. Now some of them, he looks like an old man because he's like a balding baby Jesus, but still you got a lot of baby Jesuses. And there was a time you want to be an artist, you painted baby Jesus. And you know what? If it was good enough back then to make Europe great, why don't we do that now to make America great? Why don't we have an edict where all art henceforth will show Donald Trump? Ultimize.