DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus The Obama Portrait

This is laughable.

Not really, but keep reaching.

We’re once again trying to compare a painter to something that ACTUALLY has a leglistative impact on a specific community and/or the country as a whole.

But there is atleast 3 other people on this board as clueless as you are on the context so I’m not surprised.

Three paragraphs later:
Which brings us back to the lady with the severed head. Like most Wiley paintings, this one has a backstory: Her name is Triesha Lowe, Wiley explains. She’s a stay-at-home mom whom Wiley found at the Fulton Mall. Her pose is a riff on classical depictions by Caravaggio and Gentileschi, of the biblical story of Judith beheading Holofernes. And the severed head? “She’s one of my assistants.”

The alt-right couldn't be transparent if they were made out of glass.

That may have been the original idea but the specifics were a play on 'kill whitey'. Those are the painter's own words.

Did Obama know about this when he selected this guy to be his personal portrait maker? You have to admit the whole thing is pretty bizarre.

Actually in his own words it's Judith beheading Holofernes. Which is why he titled it that. Then again you read Milo.

He also said that having it be a black woman holding a white woman's head was a play on the whole 'kill whitey' thing. Did he not?


That's news to me.

j/c

The portraits are goofy as hell. And yes, I'd say that if a white person painted them, and if the subjects were my parents.

The politics of the artist (for O's anyway) are on full display, but hidden in his "artistic expression".

I can't even imagine the outrage that would've occurred had W, HW, Reagan, etc. (white, republicans) had a white painter with a history of painting decapitated blacks, do their portrait. Historical or not.

Front page news on CNN/MSNBC calling it racist hate speech (expression?), demands for congressional inquiries and for people to be fired, etc.

So after finally acknowledging the painter's own words you see that it can be a multifaceted answer?

There is the obvious answer and then there is a biblical reference that some are trying to play it off as.

How quickly we come in two hours!

I'm not sure what's the bigger atrocity: the severed head or the horrific wall paper????

Even though I can't really say "i get it" in terms of the composition, it is pretty well done. Obama's, i don't see the connection or contradiction of the relationship between he and the bushes.

Michelle's is well done and i like the color palette more, but it doesn't really look like her and I'm not quite convinced a more accurate depiction of her is being lost in the 'style'.

But then, I'm not an art critic, so what do i know.


DC, as far associations that look bad, I don't think it has mattered in quite some time. Bill Ayers was involved in the actual killing of people, and his fans never cared. You aren't going to get any of them to reflect on the appropriateness of a pictorial of a fantasy.

WOOHOO I found Waldo in both portraits

We are on the brink of Nuclear war with a lunatic. We have people starving, we have homeless Vets and we have homeless citizens in general.

We have lunatics in our midst that are HOME GROWN killers and all we talk about is a freakin WALL..

And this is important?

Gimme a break

Kehinde Wiley is the artist and he is probably the most significant artist in America today. He is black and he chooses to paint black men, in particular, in the pose and style of the old paintings of powerful European white men. However, they are wearing 21st century street/hip hop clothes. His paintings of women are also done in style of powerful white women in history.

I love the fact that he has chosen to paint a black woman in the same pose as many white conquering men. I also love the fact that white men on this football fan board are having issues with this painting yet, don't seem to take notice, nor care, of the paintings of the past that depict white violence and land conquering. Wiley's point has been made.

I'm not a fan of these portraits because I don't like the style. BUT I am cracking up at the far right's reaction to these on social media and alt media. MELTDOWNS.

Let's try to envision a roughly equivalent scenario, but the other way around.

The year is 2026, and Donald Trump is a year and change removed from office. For his Presidential portraits, he handpicks an artist who has been known to create paintings of white women holding the severed heads of black women. In an article with a right-wing magazine, he relays how this was a spin-off of a biblical scene, and the races were used because of the whole "kill blackey" thing.

Yeah I'm pretty sure heads would roll over that one. Pardon the pun.

I haven't followed it other than reading a couple articles that popped up on Google. That said, I think this is really kind of a dangerous precedent, and the progressives' hypocrisy on this is astounding. We've all seen things not even one tenth as provocative be called racist. Even in this thread some goofball said that those who didn't like the paintings only think that way because of racism, or something to that effect.

This is fine-- just be consistent with this logic and try to apply it equally.

The Left has been trying to shine this turd for years and now we have our proof in pictures.

I try, but admittedly, I don't always succeed.

Yea.. just like your Illegals and the phony Russian scandal ....give us all a break

j/c

Not a fan of either example.

1. BHO's portrait looks more like an illustration than Fine Art.
2. Portraits are supposed to capture the subject's likeness. This to me looks more like "Generic Black Woman In Flowing Dress."


Bad art is almost worse than no art at all.
Done with this subject.

I am not going to get into the political ramifications or anything else, but I thought the first painting was horrible. It looked worse than amateurish. The second one did not seem to capture the look of the former first lady.

Me no like.

I don't care about the 'politics' either.
Neither piece is pleasing to look at.

Simple, really.

"Carravaggio" a white painter, has painted several portraits of white men and a white women holding the decapitated heads of various men of color. And he's also painted portraits of Jesus, Mary, along with leaders of his time and other biblical figures. No big deal. Where's the outrage?

Seems to be at least as important as the fact that Jeff Sessions referenced the Anglo-American history of the Sheriff's office when addressing the Sheriffs.. a thread you never questioned and commented twice to make sure everybody knows you think the right is racist.

Has a former President ever asked this person to do their portrait? Probably not since he's been dead for 300 years...

I always get a kick out of watching both sides jump through hoops trying to Obamasplain or Trumpsplain why it's always different when it happens to them... and then accuse the other side of doing just that.

Did he paint a portrait of a u.s. president? Probably hard to do, as he was born in 1571. Died in 1610 I believe?

If anybody could make it happen, it would be Trump.

Art is judged through the eyes of the beholder.
When I go to an Art Gallery, I look at each painting and think of what it means to me, how it speaks to me.

In this case I interpret the man's portrait as having very long and thin hands for picking the pockets of the people he served.

The woman's portrait is an example of the brutal and hateful Racism espoused by many in the Black community today.

Lol. You take the left side of every argument that comes down the pike.

He only orders left wings at KFC.

he moved to england cause they drive on the left side of the road.

How 'bout left sided Twix?

on Tinder, he swipes left.

I find it hilarious and somewhat puzzling that people find this painting so "offensive". Yet, many of these same people who find it so "offensive" are also the same people who have posted favorably in this forum about guns, horror movies, war, violent video games etc. At the end of the day...this is a painting. A static image. Yet, it has provoked rage in so many people who seemingly do not seem to be too bothered by ultra violent video games (I remember somebody in here posted about how excited they were for 'Friday The 13th' video game and playing as "Jason") or, horror movies where people are routinely killed off in multiple ways, have argued for no gun laws, posted images of their own guns etc. and have talked at length about going to war or "nuking NK". Yet, a painting by a black artist bothers them to the point where they feel incensed enough to post about it.

But then again...I quite enjoy that because that reminds me about the power of art and how it still has the ability to transform and transcend boundaries.

Dudes literally be using $20 bills everyday and they think this portrait is racist or that the artist is a racist. Not sure which is funnier since Ralph Earl lived most of his late life bossing slaves around. They also all love Wahoo, go figure.

What exactly is racist about the portrait? I want to hear someone's expert opinion. Is it discriminatory? Does it invoke racial violence or promote harmful stereotypes?

It has to be racist because it has a funky black folkart vibe to it. It doesn't blend well with the old white guys in suits in the oval pics.

j/c:

Yeah gotta hate those old White guys, right.