The Danish artist behind a viral EUR 100,000 ‘Orange Plague’ statue depicting a naked, overweight Donald Trump sitting on the back of a thin man has said he did the work because the American president had “destroyed his whole world”.
The sculpture, which has gone viral on social media after being photographed at the Munich Security Conference in Bavaria, Germany, was created by Jens Galshiot, 71, who has been working with copper and bronze for nearly 50 years.
Galshiot told Newsflash in an exclusive interview that usually he would not craft a statue that is of someone in particular, a recognisable face, but he added: “Donald Trump has destroyed my whole world.
“He has destroyed every rule about the environment, every rule about freedom of expression, the law system. All the things I believe in personally, he has destroyed. And this is a big problem for me.”
The statue, which was installed in Munich for the duration of the conference from 13th to 15th February, has notched up over 138,000 likes on Reddit and depicts Trump sitting on a man’s shoulders while holding scales in his right hand and a golf club in the other.
Speaking about how the idea developed, Galshiot said that the West is made up of rule-based societies and Trump has broken all the rules, adding: “This is a big problem for the Western world.”
He said: “The original statue, many years ago, was called ‘Survival of the Fattest’, so, a big lady sitting on a man. And then Donald Trump came along, and then we transformed the statue to put Trump up there and a man down there.”
Galshiot, who said he funded the nearly EUR 100,000 (GBP 85,000) copper work himself, explained: “This is because this sculpture was originally a goddess, Lady Justice, so when I make Trump a symbol like that, it makes him the decider of what is wrong and what is good.”
He added: “It is a symbol of power. He has the power to decide what is wrong and what is good and what has a good meaning and what has a bad meaning. And then he is sitting on the back of a man, saying: ‘I will do everything I can to help, except get off your back’.
“It is hypocrites who say that. So this is about Trump, but this is also about me and you in a way. We are sitting there with all our good thinking about the world, the third world, world hunger, Africa, refugees… But in the end, we take care of our own place and our own money, and our own welfare in Europe. We don’t want to share, really.
“So this sculpture also reflects back on us, on everybody in the Western world.”
Galshiot explained how the sculpture was made, saying: “The process is that we built it out of wax at the beginning, and then we transformed it into copper, and I am used to that, as I only work in bronze and in copper.
“It’s quite an expensive sculpture. It’s quite expensive to do this kind of thing. It cost nearly EUR 100,000. It’s really, really expensive.”
He said he funded the project himself and does not have a crowdfunding mechanism in place, adding that the technique used to make the large Trump sculpture has been “the same for the last 7,000 years”, saying: “The symbol of the Trump statue is stronger because of this value.”
The artist provided Newsflash with video footage showing 3D-printed miniatures of the Trump sculpture being produced in his workshop in Odense, where 17 people work and around 5,000 visit the workshop every year.
Galshiot said that “normally we give them away” at protests and events, adding that they had given out 6,000 of them in Brazil and around 2,000 in Munich, but he said that patrons could also purchase them from his workshop for DKK 50 (GBP 5.84).
Galshiot said that the statue would be heading to another event next, saying: “First we used it in Brazil and then we put it in the Greenland demonstrations. Now we have put it in Munich, and then we have a big Trump meeting in Denmark, and we will put it there too.
“And then I think we will take it with us to Turkey, to Antalya, where COP 31 is about to take place, where we will have a lot of discussions about the environment.”
He also addressed Trump’s interest in the US taking control of Greenland, saying it was representative of his interest in “ownership of all the money in the world, of the ownership of everybody in the system, in every corner of the world, in Venezuela, everywhere. He has no limits. I think the Greenland discussion is about that.”
Galshiot compared Trump saying that he wanted to own Greenland and pay off the people who live there to the attitude of the colonial powers 200 years ago, saying: “He is taking on the role of colonist. He said the words ‘I want to buy them’.
“It’s really, really strange, the lack of limits in Trump’s world, the lack of limits in the MAGA movement. To actually say that, it is extremely arrogant.
“I’m quite sure the people of Greenland are running away screaming from that idea. Now, they even like Denmark!
“Because Denmark is not saying this kind of thing. Of course, Denmark is also a kind of colonist in Greenland. But I think things have changed a little bit, because Trump really is much worse.”
And speaking about the sculpture going viral on Reddit during the Munich Security Conference, he said: “I think it was a good idea to take it down there.”
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Story By: Joseph Golder, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Newsflash
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