Gonzo Illustrator Ralph Steadman Draws the American Presidents, from Nixon to Trump

In a 2012 inter­view with Nation­al Pub­lic Radio, car­toon­ist Ralph Stead­man, best known for his col­lab­o­ra­tions with Gonzo jour­nal­ist Hunter S. Thomp­son, lament­ed the qual­i­ty of the can­di­dates in that year’s Pres­i­den­tial race:

The prob­lem is there are no Nixons around at the moment. That’s what we need — we need a real good Nixon to give some­thing for oth­er peo­ple to get their teeth into, to real­ly … loathe him, to become them­selves more effec­tive as oppo­si­tion lead­ers.

Alas, his prayers have been answered.

Stead­man, who has brought his inky sen­si­bil­i­ties to bear on such works as Ani­mal Farm and Alice in Won­der­land, has a new Amer­i­can pres­i­dent to add to the col­lec­tion he dis­cussed sev­er­al years ago, in the video above.

Steadman’s pen was the sword that ren­dered Ger­ald Ford as a scare­crow, Ronald Rea­gan as a vam­pire, and George W. Bush as a mon­key in a cage of his own mak­ing.

Barack Oba­ma, one of the can­di­dates in that com­par­a­tive­ly bland 2012 elec­tion, is depict­ed as a tena­cious, slen­der vine, strain­ing ever upward.

Jim­my Carter, some­what less benign­ly, is a pup­py eager­ly fetch­ing a stick with which to par­don Nixon, the Welsh cartoonist’s dark muse, first encoun­tered when he accom­pa­nied Thomp­son on the road trip that yield­ed Fear and Loathing: On the Cam­paign Trail ’72.

And now…

Don­ald Trump has giv­en Stead­man rea­son to come out fight­ing. With luck, he’ll stay out as long as his ser­vices are required. The above por­trait, titled “Porky Pie,” was sent, unso­licit­ed, to Ger­ry Brakus, an edi­tor of the New States­man, who pub­lished it on Decem­ber 17, 2015.

At the time, Stead­man had no rea­son to believe the man he’d anthro­po­mor­phized as a human pig hybrid, squeezed into bloody flag-print under­pants, would become the 45th pres­i­dent:

Trump is unthink­able. A thug and a moles­ter. Who wants him?

The por­trait’s hideous­ness speaks vol­umes, but it’s also worth look­ing beyond the obvi­ous-seem­ing inspi­ra­tion for the title to a ref­er­ence few Amer­i­cans would get. “Pork pie”—or porky—is Cock­ney rhyming slang for “a lie.”

See a gallery of Steadman’s por­traits of Amer­i­can pres­i­dents on his web­site.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Ralph Steadman’s Sur­re­al­ist Illus­tra­tions of George Orwell’s Ani­mal Farm (1995)

How Hunter S. Thomp­son — and Psilo­cy­bin — Influ­enced the Art of Ralph Stead­man, Cre­at­ing the “Gonzo” Style

Break­ing Bad Illus­trat­ed by Gonzo Artist Ralph Stead­man

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is an author, illus­tra­tor, the­ater mak­er and Chief Pri­ma­tol­o­gist of the East Vil­lage Inky zine.  Fol­low her @AyunHalliday