Trump’s view of the White House garden is no bed of roses

Trump wants to pave over the grass in the White House Rose Garden, and as usual, his reasoning makes no sense. Removing the garden grass but keeping the roses will make them look like blades of grass sticking up between pavement cracks.

To hear it told by Trump’s Communications Director Steven Cheung, “The White House has not been given any tender, loving care in many decades, so President Trump is taking necessary steps in order to preserve and restore the greatness and glory of ‘the People’s House."

“The People’s House”? Not exactly. Trump is taking steps to imitate his patio at his members-only country club in Palm Beach. And since when is ripping up a lawn considered "tender, loving care”?

You may remember Melania Trump’s invasion of the Rose Garden in 2020 when she stripped the place of the Rose trees and installed a bronze sculpture by Isamu Noguchi titled “Floor Frame” that resembled debris from a construction site.

In her Instagram, Melania wrote, “The art piece is humble in scale, complements the authority of the Oval Office.” And I asked at the time if "Floor Frame" was picked because of its lowly height.

Given the sheepish elevation, it must look almost bashful to the Trumps. Is that what attracted Melania, a work that doesn’t detract from the “authority of the Oval Office”? As if her husband hadn’t already diminished the office with his antics.

Aside from what Melania thought, there’s what Noguchi intended, which makes clear that "Floor Frame" is in the wrong place.

He told Art News that he was thinking of the “essentiality of a floor.” In that case, this work would be better suited in an actual floor, not a garden.

Besides, if a work by Noguchi is the artist of choice for the Rose Garden, one of his stone works would have been the better pick. Historian Katherine Hoffman quotes him in her 1946 book “Explorations: The Visual Arts Since 1945” saying, “Stone is the primary medium, and nature is where it is, and nature is where we have to go to experience life.”

For that experience, something like Noguchi’s “Landscape in Time,” five carved and weathered granite boulders in varying sizes standing before the Seattle Federal Building, would be fitting in the Rose Garden.

Of course, the most fitting things for the Rose Garden are the roses. Can it be that the invasion of the Rose Gaden by both the president and his wife is because it was Jackie Kennedy’s idea?

Like

Comment

Send

Share