Photograph by Kevin Bulluck
Amy Sherald, Trans Forming Liberty, 2024. Oil on linen, 123 × 76 1/2 × 2 1/2 inches (312.4 × 194.3 × 6.35 cm). Courtesy of the artist and Hauser and Wirth. © Amy Sherald.
Amy Sherald’s painting Trans Forming Liberty is a work of art that requires no further explanation beyond its title. It portrays a Black, transgender woman in a pose reflective of the Statue of Liberty, her upraised torch brimming with flowers.
But additional information is exactly what the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery sought to provide when it proposed that the painting be exhibited alongside a video of people reacting to the work from their varying perspectives. Sherald, a gifted artist best known for her stunning 2018 portrait of then First Lady Michelle Obama, balked at this, saying it “would have opened up for debate the value of trans visibility.”
And so Sherald decided in July to withdraw her entire exhibit, American Sublime, which would have been the first solo show by a Black artist in the Portrait Gallery’s history. (The exhibit had previously been on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, and before that at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.)
“I entered into this collaboration in good faith, believing that the institution shared a commitment to presenting work that reflects the full, complex truth of American life,” Sherald wrote in a letter to Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III explaining her decision. “Unfortunately, it has become clear that the conditions no longer support the integrity of the work as conceived.’’
A spokesperson for the Smithsonian said the proposed video was meant as “a way to contextualize the piece” and expressed their disappointment over the cancellation. At the White House, which is working to trample LGBTQ+ rights, including the right of trans people to serve in the military, the cancellation was met with gloating.
“The Trans Forming Liberty painting, which sought to reinterpret one of our nation’s most sacred symbols through a divisive and ideological lens, fundamentally strayed from the mission and spirit of our national museums,” said Lindsey Halligan, a special assistant to President Donald Trump. “The Statue of Liberty is not an abstract canvas for political expression—it is a revered and solemn symbol of freedom, inspiration, and national unity that defines the American spirit.”
This is not art criticism, it’s art authoritarianism, and it cries out for resistance.
Months before the Amy Sherald debacle, in an Executive Order issued on March 27 titled “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” Trump claimed the Smithsonian has “in recent years, come under the influence of a divisive, race-centered ideology” that aims to “portray American and Western values as inherently harmful and oppressive.”
The order criticized an exhibit at the Smithsonian American Art Museum titled The Shape of Power: Stories of Race and American Sculpture, which had the audacity to assert that “[s]ocieties including the United States have used race to establish and maintain systems of power, privilege, and disenfranchisement,” as though this was somehow refutable. The Executive Order also falsely stated that the Smithsonian’s American Women’s History Museum, which has not yet been built, “plans on celebrating the exploits of male athletes participating in women’s sports.”
In response to these imagined threats, the order directed Vice President J.D. Vance to work with Halligan to purge “improper ideology” from Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo. (Yes, it specifically referenced the zoo, occasioning some media head-scratching but no definitive evidence of, say, “wokeness” in the Reptile Discovery Center.)
Trump’s order also called for a review of “all public monuments, memorials, statues, markers, or similar properties” under the purview of the Department of the Interior to ensure that they do not contain “descriptions, depictions, or other content that inappropriately disparage Americans past or living (including persons living in colonial times), and instead focus on the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people.” This has raised doubts over whether it is permissible for historical sites to acknowledge the brutality of slavery.
In mid-August, the White House ordered a review of all Smithsonian museums and exhibitions, ahead of the nation’s 250th birthday next year, “to ensure alignment with the President’s directive to celebrate American exceptionalism.” Trump followed this with a post on his social media network, Truth Social, in which he declared that an “OUT OF CONTROL” Smithsonian is too focused on “how bad Slavery was, and how unaccomplished the downtrodden have been.”
All of this is in keeping with Trump’s radical determination to impose his own brand of political correctness and stamp out truth-telling in the places where it is needed most.
This is part of a larger Trump takeover of cultural institutions. In February, Trump seized control of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., firing its longtime president and installing himself as chair of its board of trustees. He promised there will henceforth be “NO MORE DRAG SHOWS, OR OTHER ANTI-AMERICAN PROPAGANDA—ONLY THE BEST.” Republicans in Congress have also set out to rename the center’s opera house after First Lady Melania Trump, despite a stipulation in the law which first established the Kennedy Center that prohibits renaming any of its facilities.
In May, Trump announced that he had fired Kim Sajet, director of the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, claiming she is “a highly partisan person, and a strong supporter of DEI,” a reference to diversity, equity, and inclusion. The White House provided The Washington Post a list of seventeen alleged transgressions on Sajet’s part, including that she has given money to Democratic candidates and advocacy groups, praised infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci, and allowed a caption for the museum’s presidential portrait of Trump to mention his two impeachments and his “incitement of insurrection” on January 6, 2021.
But unlike the Kennedy Center, the Smithsonian’s museum leaders cannot be fired by the President. Its Board of Regents affirmed this in early June, but also launched an internal review to seek out partisan bias. A few days later, Sajet resigned, saying her continued service had become a distraction.
The White House, predictably, took a victory lap. “On day one, President Trump made clear that there is no place for dangerous anti-American ideology in our government and institutions,” declared spokesperson Davis Ingle in a statement to The Hill following Sajet’s resignation. “The Trump Administration is committed to restoring American greatness and celebrating our nation’s proud history.”
Programming for the Smithsonian is Congressionally allocated, and exhibits are often funded by private donations, putting them outside of the executive branch’s purview. But, as The Washington Post reported, Trump’s Executive Order “makes clear that the administration will find a way to punish the museums financially if desired changes are not enacted.”
There can be little doubt that fear of retribution played a key role in the Smithsonian’s decision in late July to remove references to Trump’s two impeachments from a display at the National Museum of American History. Officials pegged this as temporary, saying “a future and updated exhibit will include all impeachments.” We shall see.
It is equally clear that fear is what drove the Smithsonian’s effort to dilute the power of Sherald’s Trans Forming Liberty by including a video that would give voice to people who think trans people have no right to live their authentic lives, much less participate in the American experience of liberty.
Since Sherald withdrew her show from the Portrait Gallery, Trans Forming Liberty has been extensively covered and reproduced; it has even appeared on the cover of The New Yorker. But while pulling the plug on her exhibit took courage, it may have been a stronger act of resistance for Sherald to have simply refused to allow the video, forcing the Smithsonian or its Trump Administration overlords to do the canceling. Similarly, perhaps Sajet should have insisted on her right to keep her job, despite having once said something nice about Anthony Fauci.
It is hardly an original insight to note that seeking to rewrite history and cover up national mistakes is “straight out of the authoritarian playbook,” to quote a phrase that has lately gotten too much use. It is also contrary to democratic norms and subject to popular rebuke. People don’t like being told what they can and cannot read, say, see, or do.
One clear and immediate consequence of Trump taking over the Kennedy Center was that subscriptions for the coming season of programming declined sharply. “Ticket buyers, subscribers, and donors have spoken with their wallets,” a center staffer, who, for obvious reasons, spoke on condition of anonymity, told The Washington Post, calling Trump’s action a “hostile takeover.”
This is a time that calls out for uncommon courage. A time for resistance and not acquiescence. Don’t obey in advance, or ever. Give the people something to react to and ways to fight back. Our liberty depends on it.