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Street Artist Censors 'Offensive' Hillary Clinton Mural By Dressing Her In Niqab

Street Artist Censors 'Offensive' Clinton Mural By Dressing Her In Niqab
Instagram/Lushsux2

Australian street artist Lushsux caused quite a stir last week after his mural of Hillary Clinton in an American flag swimsuit, with dollar bills stuffed into the waistband, went viral.

The artist revealed the risqué mural, originally captioned “stupid sexy Hillary,” shortly after Clinton became the first woman to accept a presidential nomination in the United States of America. Cool move, bro.

Not long after the mural went up on the side of a Melbourne small business in Footscray, the local Maribyrnong Council urged the business to remove it. Almost simultaneously, the artist’s Instagram was shut down. (You can now find Lushsux as Lushsux2.)

Stephen Wall, the council’s chief, explained his reasoning to Fairfax Media: “We believe it is offensive because of the depiction of a near-naked woman, not on the basis of disrespect to Hillary Clinton, in accordance with the Graffiti Prevention Act 2007.”

@kevin did u donate today ?

A photo posted by Lushsux (@lushsux2) on

Lushsux, who deemed the outcry against his work “pathetic,” resolved to shut up his haters by censoring the mural himself.

The artist covered up Clinton with a niqab, the veil worn by some Muslim women. A caption accompanying the image on Instagram reads: “This is no longer a wall of a supposed ‘offensive’ and near naked Hillary Clinton, it is now a depiction of a beautiful Muslim woman. No reasonable person would consider this offensive.”

Clinton is not the only public figure to become the target of Lushsux’s painfully unsubtle, satirical street art. He’s behind the mural that appears to copy Illma Gore’s rendering of Donald Trump with a micropenis, and also referenced Ron English’s “Pop Marilyn Mickeys with his portrayal of topless Melania Trump.

I don't know if I made it more offensive or less?

A photo posted by Lushsux (@lushsux2) on

In his defense, Lushsux did create the kind-of-funny “RIP Taylor Smith” tribute following Swift’s recent feud with Kanye West. The name mixup, it appears, was an “unintentional mistake,” but perhaps the best artistic decision he’s made thus far.

Gee I wonder who may be behind the deletion of @lushsux #lushsux

A photo posted by Lushsux (@lushsux2) on

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