PRESIDENT SUPER DUDE: PILLORIED 

TED CHAPIN

Mixed media

12 x 10 inches, edition 1/1

2019 

Trump suffers from an extreme case of narcissistic personality disorder. The potential consequences for the human race of this man’s mental state, now that he has acquired power sufficient to destroy civilization with the push of a button, suggests a storyline from a vintage action-hero comic book: the fate of the world at the mercy of an all-powerful villain. 

The number one action hero of Trump’s childhood was Superman, who was the leading 1950’s DC Comics character, the first action hero to have a TV series with a large and loyal audience tuning in every week. Fighting for ‘Truth, Justice and the American Way’, Superman’s enemies were an endless progression of comic book villains. 

Over the many decades of Superman comics, some of the story lines have featured Superman overwhelmed by evil forces, a rogue villainous Superman who becomes a direct threat to truth, justice and the American way. That rogue genre of Superman comic books provided me a metaphorical stand-in for Trump for my new series ‘The Adventures of President SuperDude’.

In this series I have collaged comic book images of a rogue Superman into wall-hung three-dimensional cartoons composed of typewriter pieces, plastics, and other found objects, mechanically connected with nuts and bolts as well as springs. These machine-like constructions illustrate the dysfunctional, illogical machinery already evident in the nascent Trump administration. 

They also foreshadow the likely disasters ahead resulting from the executive branch of the American government headed by a mentally ill man.