Golden statue depicting Trump nude appears at European Parliament

A golden statue of a nude President Trump appeared inside the European Parliament as part of a two-day exhibition this week.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico on Thursday called for its removal, although it had already been taken down.

Danish artist Jens Galschiøt installed his sculpture, called “The Orange Plague,” in the building in Strasbourg, France, on Tuesday. Trump is depicted as nude and covered in 23-karat gold leaf, with his legs around the shoulders of a bronze-colored, frail man atop a short pedestal.

Below the statue reads the text: “I am sitting on the back of a man. He is sinking under my burden. I will do anything to help him. Except stepping down from his back.”

Fico called the statue “a sign of the decline of the European Union” and urged European Parliament President Roberta Metsola to remove it.

“The mocking statue of U.S. President Donald Trump displayed on the premises of the European Parliament is a sign of the decline of the entire EU,” he wrote on the social platform X . “I do not agree with all of the American president’s policies, not by a long shot. But at a time that calls for dialogue and mutual respect, insulting our partners on official premises demonstrates a profound failure to understand the times we live in.”

The prime minister called it “sad” that the EU “can no longer distinguish between the legitimate right to hold a different opinion and the actions of spiritually bankrupt individuals, adventurers and lunatics.”

Galschiøt promoted the statue on his X account, writing on Wednesday that he was handing out 10,000 miniature versions of the statue to the parliamentary building’s visitors. A post on Monday showed the statue covered in orange cloth before it was unveiled.

“Tomorrow I reveal the sculpture in the European Parliament. I hope it is well received and that it sparks a debate about friendship and power dynamics,” he wrote .

Galschiøt, known for politically provocative art , wrote on his website that the work was inspired by Hans Christian Anderson’s “The Emperor Wears No Clothes.” He called the statue “a satirical outcry against Trump and the U.S. assault on the green transition and the rule-based world order.”

“Trump is depicted as a self-proclaimed King of Justice,” he continued. “He sits on the back of a frail man, holding a golf club next to a world-shaped golf ball in one hand, and scales symbolizing his power to define justice in the other hand.”

The legislative body’s press service told The Hill that the statue was removed later on Wednesday.

The sculpture was installed as part of a two-day exhibition led by Danish left-wing Member of the European Parliament (MEP) Per Clausen. The European Parliament stated that MEPs must have any installations approved in advance by quaestors, who are tasked with overseeing administrative and financial matters.

“The rules in place outline that cultural events and exhibitions shall under no circumstances be offensive or of an inflammatory nature or contradictory to the values on which the Union is founded or likely to give rise to disturbances in the designated exhibition areas,” the press office told The Hill.

Clausen said in a statement that no one should “accept living in fear and self-censorship” and that anyone “so thin-skinned that you cannot handle this sculpture being exhibited in the European Parliament, then you do not belong on the world stage.”