This past week I read with interest an article about Nelson Shanks, the renowned portrait painter whose subjects have included (to name a few) the late Princess Diana, Prince Charles, Pope John Paul II, Luciano Pavarotti, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Margaret Thatcher and a group portrait of the four female Supreme Court justices.
It’s the Clinton portrait I was reading about. Apparently Shanks’ portrait of Clinton, which was commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery in 2001, includes a reference to White House intern Monica Lewinsky’s infamous blue dress. According to Shanks, that’s what the “shadow” is beneath the fireplace mantle.
Asked about the inclusion of the dress in the painting, Shanks told People magazine, “I had to do something to break up that line,” referring to what we are to presume would otherwise be empty space. He went on to say that it was also intended as a metaphor for “the shadow the affair cast over the presidency.” And that the inclusion of the blue dress in shadow is “reflective of history and an anecdote that history should respect and know about at the same time.”
Clinton’s dalliance with Lewinsky was not his finest moment in the White House, to be sure. But what bugged me about this story was the artist’s subterfuge, his duplicity, the sneaky way he cast his own shadow over the former president in the name of art and history. (He also left out Clinton’s wedding ring).
Certainly it can be said that one role of an artist is to offer commentary on current events, but the role of an artist selected by the president as his official portrait painter, and then commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery to carry out the president’s wish is, I would argue, representation without embellishment or elaboration. One wonders what Shanks might have snuck into Reagan’s portrait (allusions to the Iran-Contra affair?) Or Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s (the shadowy outline of Camilla Parker Bowles? Murky references to bulimia?).