Donald Trump and graffiti art

Everything indicates that the next presidential race will be between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. The media presence of both contestants will be even higher in the coming months. Regardless of the winner of the next elections, both have become an icon of an America more divided than ever.

Many artists all around the world have been inspired by them to create controversial and striking artwork. Either to ridicule them or to praise them, we find their image on the TV, on the Internet and of course on the streets.

One of these works that is traveling around the world is a graffiti mural in Lithuania outside a restaurant where Donald Trump appears passionately kissing Vladimir Putin.

This mural was painted by a local artist named Mindaugas Bonanu and has attracted the attention in both Lithuania and in the international press. The graffiti mural is a “copy” of a famous photograph of the leader Leonid Brrezhnev and East German President Erich Honecker.

The image shows the 2 men kissing on the lips, common practice at that time to greet each other between socialist leaders. In 1990, someone painted this image in the remains of the Berlin Wall and it became the most recognised artwork that was left between East and West Berlin.

The similarities between Trump and Putin are clear. The protagonists of the mural have an ego too big and it’s funny that they get along so well. USA and Russia are currently in a new Cold War and Trump may be a president who wants to be a friend of Russia.

Putin and Trump have made statements of mutual admiration. Putin referred to Trump as “a colorful personality and undoubtedly very talented.” And Trump replied that “it is an honor to be admired by a man so respected beyond his own country”

Their personal relationship may be good, however, in the campaign videos of Trump, Russia appears as a geopolitical rival.

This mural reminds us that perhaps the encounter between these two characters will take place in a Baltic country dominated by Moscow where we predict that the US and Russia will meet again with their tongues or their tanks.