PinterestPhotographer Tyler Shields doesn’t want to explain what he’s trying to say in his latest, and very arresting, photo, which features comedian Kathy Griffin holding a replica of President Donald Trump’s bloodied, decapitated head in her hand.
On Tuesday, the gory and shocking image debuted and instantly drew quite a bit of outrage. The president’s son Donald Trump Jr. called it
Griffin addressed the image on Twitter:
1/ I caption this “there was blood coming out of his eyes, blood coming out of his…wherever” Also @tylershields great Photog/film maker. pic.twitter.com/eKqr44NOl6
— Kathy Griffin (@kathygriffin)
2/ OBVIOUSLY, I do not condone ANY violence by my fans or others to anyone, ever! I’m merely mocking the Mocker in Chief.
— Kathy Griffin (@kathygriffin)
Shortly after the picture started circulating, EW hopped on the phone for a quick conversation with Shields about the new photo.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: How did you come up with the concept for this picture?
TYLER SHIELDS: We’d been talking about doing something and she said to me, “I’m not afraid to get political if you want or make a statement if you want.” It’s always a collaborative process, especially with someone like Kathy, but it was one of those things where we didn’t know exactly what we were gonna do until we got there. Then, once we got there, it just kind of escalated into that. There were a bunch of different ideas thrown around and then, I was like, “This is the one we gotta do.”
Was this a one-day shoot?
Yeah.
Where did you get the Trump bust at on such short notice?
The shoot happened in one day, but we’d been talking about it for a while. We were able to source some things and do stuff like that before… We had about 10 different ideas and we had the props and we had the things there for them, but then on the day, it was like, “This is the one. This is the one to do for sure.”
Why did you want to pursue this one specifically?
A few different things. Obviously, there’s the freedom of speech thing, which is great. It’s such a timely image. We see millions of visuals every day and to make something that really stands out is very difficult now. I think that this has the potential to make people stop for a second and say, “What is that?”
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Were you worried that this might incite violence? Many have accused Trump of doing this with the comments he has made.
No, I’m never the guy that’s like, “We’re making this piece of art so people are gonna go hurt other people because of it.” I always look at it like, when you make something, it makes people not want to do it. That’s just me personally. But again, the great thing about making something like this is that, look, you make it and people have their opinion on it and that’s the fun of it. A compliment and an insult are the same thing; the insult just takes longer to write.
While you were putting this together, were there any other concerns?
There’s a behind-the-scenes video (see below) which just went live and literally in the video, we’re watching one of the videos that we were filming and Kathy’s honest reaction was, “We’re gonna have to move to Mexico because they’re gonna put me in jail.” Now again, fortunately, we have freedom of speech [in the first amendment] and all art is generally protected by these things, but again, this was her first thought, “Will you bail me out of jail?” You know, again,…
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