Angela Merkel went to an art museum instead of watching President Trump's inaugural address

Angela Merkel.
(Image credit: BERND VON JUTRCZENKA/AFP/Getty Images)

While President Donald Trump was being sworn in as leader of the free world on Friday morning, German Chancellor Angela Merkel was gazing at artwork at the opening of the Barberini Museum in Potsdam, Germany. Merkel, it seems, opted for the soothing colors of Claude Monet's paintings over Trump's inaugural address, which discussed "American carnage" and "radical Islamic terrorism."

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Merkel's spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said her government would "study with interest" Trump's speech.

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