Andy Yoder (B. 1957)

When the Vermont-based American sculptor Andy Yoder created his coruscating lead crystal bust Donald in 2007, its subject was an infamous property mogul and celebrity. With that subject now the 45th President of the United States, Yoder’s sculpture has acquired a remarkable new relevance. Crafted over three years and originally exhibited at New York’s Winkleman Gallery alongside representations of TV personality Martha Stewart and Walmart founder Samuel Walton, Donald’s amber colouration reflects the palette favoured within Trump’s own hotels. Realistic features, such as the pits of the magnate’s face, play off against the smoother, almost cartoon-like slickness of his hair. A protrusion at the bust’s pinnacle indicates it as a piggy-bank, playing on Trump’s pre-presidential notoriety as a symbol of extreme wealth. ‘I use,’ Yoder has said, ‘domestic objects as the common denominators of our personal environment. Altering them is a way of questioning the attitudes, fears and unwritten rules which have formed that environment and our behaviour within it.’ By transforming a repository for small change into a vision of a modern-day tycoon, Yoder calls attention to the connection to the American ideology of success. Donald’s luminous, delicate crystal-work shows both how intoxicating and how fragile such visions can be.