Kehinde Wiley has written to President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio offering to buy back a painting he made for the US Embassy in Santo Domingo, after learning it had been removed and that the State Department was considering selling it. The letter, dated 24 September 2026, was shared by the artist's gallery, Sean Kelly Gallery, and reported on 29 September. The painting, Young Artists After Siamesas 1960 (2015), was created for the embassy through the State Department's Art in Embassies programme. Wiley spent two years studying Dominican art and worked directly with young artists in Santo Domingo; the four figures depicted are Dominican art students. The painting was taken down in August 2026, with officials reportedly describing it as 'very woke' and 'aesthetically terrifying'. In the letter, Wiley explains that he made the work for a particular place and purpose: the idea that an American embassy could be a place where people see something of themselves, and that art could connect the United States with the host country — long his understanding of cultural diplomacy. He writes that if the administration no longer wishes to display the work, he would welcome the chance to purchase it through the appropriate lawful process, since the painting and the people and ideas it represents remain important to him. The episode places one of America's best-known portraitists — famous for his presidential portrait of Barack Obama — in direct appeal to the current administration, testing whether a work made for public cultural diplomacy can be returned to its maker when the state no longer wants it.