The unveiling of portraits for former President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle is raising a lot of questions. Chief among them is – What in the fresh hell are we looking at exactly?
As we reported, Mrs. Obama’s portrait was of some other woman bearing little to no resemblance to the former First Lady. In fact, it looks like a watercolor painting you might see on the middle school walls at your son or daughter’s open house.
As for the former President, there is certainly a greater resemblance to the subject, but it’s still raising some eyebrows for various reasons.
Take a look …
.@BarackObama‘s portrait at the National Portrait Gallery pic.twitter.com/gciv4D5C2k
— CSPAN (@cspan) February 12, 2018
Okay, a couple of things stand out at first blush.
One, why is the former President seemingly sitting on a floating chair inside a bush? Perhaps it symbolizes all of the times he blamed his failed presidency on George Bush. Perhaps he’s finally trying to put Bush behind him. It’s tough to say.
Two, why does Obama have hands that a raptor would be jealous of? Is the artist taking a not-so-subtle jab at President Trump, whose hand size actually became a campaign issue in the previous election? Either way, seems like the artist is overcompensating.
Viewers on social media quickly savaged the portrait.
President Obama’s official portrait, courtesy of some guy from the Choom Gang apparently pic.twitter.com/Ng5jqonEfL
— Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) February 12, 2018
Barack Obama’s portrait is entitled “President YUGE Hands” pic.twitter.com/UWkz5F0End
— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) February 12, 2018
sorry pic.twitter.com/ApQYOf5XF7
— Shoshana Weissmann, Sloth Committee Chair (@senatorshoshana) February 12, 2018
Wow, The Obamas portraits are really something… Michele is just wrong. It could be a different person. And why is President Obama in a bush? pic.twitter.com/q429zF3fwL
— Jacob Godeanu (@JacobGodeanu) February 12, 2018
Fear not, Mr. and Mrs. Obama. With all of the ridicule and embarrassment directed at these portraits, you still have friends in the compliant liberal media willing to pretend they’re top notch.
Check out this review by the New York Times, but be careful not to get too much drool from the author on your screen.
“With the unveiling here Monday at the National Portrait Gallery of the official presidential likenesses of Barack Obama and the former first lady, Michelle Obama,” the Times reports, “this city of myriad monuments gets a couple of new ones, each radiating, in its different way, gravitas (his) and glam (hers).”
Barack Obama’s portrait shows him not as a self-assured, standard-issue bureaucrat, but as an alert and troubled thinker.
Michelle Obama’s portrait overemphasizes an element of couturial spectacle, but also projects a rock-solid cool. https://t.co/tTJuIGWa4d
— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 12, 2018
There is literally nobody on the planet that thinks Barack Obama has an ounce of “gravitas” in him. I mean, seriously people …
CNN also jumped into the fray and tried to put a nice spin on the portraits.
The portraits you see, aren’t meant to actually look like the people being painted.
“These portraits break the mold of how we as the viewer consider the depiction of a person,” Kate Bennett, CNN’s White House reporter explained to us non-artist simpletons.
They broke the mold all right. Hopefully somebody can come along and fix it.
What do you think of the Obama portraits? Share your thoughts below!
