Bill Clinton's portrait includes a secret Monica Lewinsky reference, painter claims

(Image credit: AP Photo/Mary Altaffer/S.Jones)

published 2 March 2015

Monica Lewinsky's shadow will forever haunt Bill Clinton. Or at least, it will forever loom over his likeness in the National Portrait Gallery.

Nelson Shanks, the artist who painted the portrait, told the Philadelphia Daily News he snuck a shadow into the picture to both literally and metaphorically depict the Lewinsky scandal.

If you look at the left-hand side of it there's a mantle in the Oval Office and I put a shadow coming into the painting and it does two things. It actually literally represents a shadow from a blue dress that I had on a mannequin, that I had there while I was painting it, but not when he was there. It is also a bit of a metaphor in that it represents a shadow on the office he held, or on him. [Philadelphia Daily News]

Shanks also claimed the Clintons "hate" the portrait and pressured the gallery to yank it, though the National Portrait Gallery denied the latter allegation.

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The painting caused a stir upon its unveiling in 2006 because it did not depict Clinton's wedding ring. Shanks explained the omission at the time by saying Clinton's ring finger "was folded over" in the image, adding, "his back isn't showing either."

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Jon Terbush is an associate editor at TheWeek.com covering politics, sports, and other things he finds interesting. He has previously written for Talking Points Memo, Raw Story, and Business Insider.