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Why America gives Donald Trump the finger – a new book documents the visceral reaction of Americans to the Trump Hollywood Star.

Photographer Kenneth O’Halloran has just published a book documenting a month long study of the powerful and often visceral reaction of Americans who visit the Donald Trump Star at the renowned Hollywood Walk of Fame. 

Over 10 million people visit the Walk annually but this year the usual tourist traffic has been joined by the hoardes of people feeling the need to publicly make known their anathema to the Republican Presidential candidate. 

The book “Bing, Bing, Bong, Bong, Bing, Bing, Bing” shows just how Americans are happy to drop their inhibitions and show the nature of their true feelings once they arrive at the Trump Star. As O’Halloran captures with these impactful images, each day people would stop by simply to “give the finger” to the Trump Star; a number encouraging their young children to do so, while others pretended to defecate over it or spit at it. The Star has also been repeatedly vandalised. 

As O’Halloran explained: “The images reveal a very interesting analysis of how this divisive Presidential campaign appears to have altered the nature of polite discourse in public places, at a tourist attraction that is the embodiment of the American dream. It was fascinating to watch the way in which people wanted to express their anti Trump feelings so strongly and so openly.”

Donald Trump was honored by receiving the 2,327th Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2007. It was for his role as the Producer in NBC’s The Apprentice. 

In 2015, following Trump’s remarks about illegal immigrants in the United States, there was a small, but vocal, public outcry to remove his Star.

An online petition to get the Star removed has been signed by over 40,000 people. Echoing Trump’s controversial pledge to build a wall between the US and Mexico earlier this summera 6” tall grey concrete wall appeared around it complete with a “Keep Out” sign, and topped with razor wire.

Kenneth O Halloran is a photographer based in Dublin. O Halloran's work has appeared in magazines such as The New York Times Magazine, The Sunday Times Magazine, Stern, Le Monde, TIME, GEO, The Financial Times Magazine and Cosmopolitan Magazine. His work has been recognised by World Press, American Photography, Alliance Francaise, and the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize. He is also a winner of the Terry O'Neill Photography award.

He was born in the West of Ireland and is a graduate of the Institute of Art, Design and Technology in Dun Laoghaire, Dublin. He holds a Masters in Fine Art Photography from The University of Ulster, Belfast.

Promo Video: https://youtu.be/gja9xgbNMlA

For more information go to www.kennethohalloran.com/books/trump

No reproduction fee.