The first Donald Trump sculpture I made was out of a chicken. It was July 2016, when he still seemed relatively harmless and I never thought his presidency would come to pass. I’d read the stories of him dodging Vietnam and I thought the chicken was perfect material, especially with its thin skin.
Then, a few months later, the Access Hollywood tape came out with him saying he could grab women by the pussy. He was suddenly a lot more disturbing. I wanted to show his true nature. I made this piece out of a dead piglet. I used most of its skin to create the face, then took the snout for his nose. You can see the dimensions of the piece because the piglet’s tail is at the bottom. It has the US food agency stamp that certifies this is American meat. It was important to show that this is not just about one person – it is an American problem.
For the eyes, I used bacon, garlic and blueberries. The lips are made from liver and there are lima beans for teeth. I ended up using the piglet’s own tongue for Trump’s. It all came from Chinatown in New York. You can find most things there. I have been criticised for using dead animals. If I worked with plastic, or something else bad for the environment, I wouldn’t be criticised. But critics don’t like the fact that my material was alive at one point. I never want an animal to have been killed just for my work. This piglet was taken to a chef, who took all the meat out and fed it to his staff at the restaurant. My critics miss the point. My work is about the nature of life itself.
I work from real photographs. You have to be very precise. Everything is overlaid on a photograph, then I will say: “No, the blueberry is 0.5mm too far to the left.” It’s painstaking. Some of these pieces, if you include the planning process and building of the sculptures, take over a year to make. With others you have to be quick. My flower pieces, for example – if you don’t get it right within a day or two, they will wilt.
Once I’ve finished, I allow the pieces to decay and photograph them again. Because this was made of meat, it would have smelled bad as it decayed – it shrank and became really gross, but the photos looked great. I let one fruit sculpture decay for quite a while and one night I came home to my apartment, opened the door, and this cloud took off – it was thousands of fruit flies. “I don’t care about the art,” I thought. “This has got to go.”
After I finished this one, Trump portraits become an obsession. I made more and more out of different materials – even mould. It’s my way of processing what is happening in the US. Do I ever think: “What the hell am I doing with my life?” You know what – I do. I used to be an IT consultant, but I stopped in 2007 to become an artist. Every now and then I think: “It was nice to have a steady paycheck.” But you only live once, and it’s kind of crazy that I get to make a living from turning dead chickens and pigs into sculptures.
I think Trump would hate this. But at the same time, he would probably say it was the worst piece of art he had ever seen, and secretly be loving the fact that the whole world is consumed by him. This piece may seem controversial but so far it has not offended any Trump supporters I’m aware of. Most of the ones who’ve seen it have accepted it and said: “OK, you made some art.” The biggest criticism I’ve had is actually from animal-lovers who say that pigs are lovely creatures and should never be compared to a man like Trump. It’s a fair point.
Klaus Enrique’s CV
Born: Mexico City, 1975.
Training: Parsons summer intensive photography course, in New York.
Influences: Arcimboldo, Bacon, Picasso.
Low point: “Spending all my money to put on a show in Miami that turned out to be a scam.”
High point: “Two weeks later, after completely running out of money, I sold one of my photographs.”
Top tip: “If you’re scared to do something then just fake courage. Fake courage is indistinguishable from whatever ‘real’ courage might be.”
