The artist, Lushux, was threatened with legal action by the city due to his portrayal of a buxom Hillary Clinton in an American flag-printed one-piece swimsuit with a stack of hundred dollars bills stuffed in the side. The painting was covered up completely by a black square.
"From the looks of it one of the progressive and tolerant councilors got offended enough to send out their dogs of war to try and intimidate the building owner into removing it." he said.
Maribyrnong Council officials claimed that the mural was "offensive" not because of it’s provocative portrayal of presidential candidate, but because of its sexual nature, even though no such fuss was made over a nude Donald Trump portrait on the other side of town.
Lushux believes the fact that the Trump mural remains uncovered is proof of a double standard. "There is a clear bias," he claimed, "or maybe it’s that (nowadays) the left is so vocal in shouting down anything that doesn’t gel with their narrative."
The artist decried the coverup as an example of supposedly "tolerant and progressive" bureaucrats balking at one of their heroes being lampooned. To prove his point, he returned to the mural site and repainted Clinton, this time covered completely covered except for her eyes and hand in a niqab, a full-body garment worn by some Muslim women. Lushux also spray-painted a message to Council members, daring them to disparage his revision saying, "If this Muslim woman offends (you),(you are) a bigot, racist (and an) islamophobe."
"My guess is the Council will remove it, make the owner pay the costs of removal and then fine him as well. Because they are petty." the painter predicted.The new mural was indeed covered up the next day.
Lushux said the owner of the building allowed him to put the mural up, and that he is being punished for allowing the image to be painted in the first place. "It’s hard enough to run a small business, now he’s got these pathetic council people trying to harass him for something he did out of goodwill — letting an artist express themselves on a boring old brick wall."
Stephen Wall, chief executive of the Council said they had no issue with the mural once the niqab was put up, but Lushux thinks the council "leaned on" the real estate agent who operates the business to scrub the piece anyway because they wouldn’t miss a chance to "win by bullying people like they usually do".
