Meet the NYC artist behind effigy of Melania Trump being eaten by a spider outside $12.5m townhouse that scandalized Manhattan’s poshest zip code
On a quiet, elm-canopied street in the Upper East Side, a large, dangling, politically-charged Halloween decoration has been causing quite the stir.
A five-foot effigy of Melania Trump cocooned in a spider’s web with a red-eyed tarantula poised to devour her has been hanging ominously over the brownstones on East 81st Street for several days.
‘It’s very subtle,’ the creator of the sculpture, Kevin Hyman, told the Daily Mail after emerging from a $12.5 million townhouse behind the cobwebs on Tuesday.
‘I spray-painted gray over her face, so that it’s not so vibrant like her normal makeup is,’ he added. ‘Her normal makeup and plastic surgery is quite startling, so this takes away from her surgery.’
Hyman, a 67-year-old New Yorker originally from Michigan, said he created the dummy on a whim after finding a mask of the First Lady’s face discarded on the sidewalk five years ago.
He said he cobbled the spectacle together in 20 minutes ‘just for fun’, using a furry spider toy from Target and a cocoon from Amazon.
A sign taped to the chrysalis reads: ‘I REALLY DON’T sCARE’ – a nod to the inflammatory Zara jacket the First Lady wore during a 2018 trip to a child migrant detention center in Texas.
Melania finally addressed the controversial jacket, which was emblazoned with the words, ‘I really don’t care, do u?’ in her 2024 memoir, claiming it was ‘a message for the media’ ‘to let them know I was unconcerned with their opinions of me’.
Kevin Hyman, 67, is the creator of a controversial Halloween sculpture of Melania Trump being devoured by a spider which has been dangling ominously over Manhattan’s East 81st Street
The spectacle, shown above, has been dividing opinion among passersby, with some viewing the effigy as a fun Halloween prank, while others have slammed it as ‘disrespectful’ to the First Lady
Though clearly not Melania’s biggest fan, Hyman said he did not intend for his sculpture to project any specific political missive.
‘I think people can take their own message from it,’ he said. ‘Either she’s being suffocated and silenced, or she just doesn’t really care, and she’s just hanging around and doing nothing. It makes people stop and think, and get a kick out of it.’
‘I’m having fun with Halloween, and having fun with the politics we have today,’ Hyman added. ‘The politics we have today are about as scary as Halloween could be.
‘I thought combining the two together would be a way to have fun with it and bring the community together. People stop, talk, laugh, some get angry. It’s turned into a conversation piece for the neighborhood, for residents and tourists alike.’
Hyman said he befriended the 90-year-old artist who owns the five-story mansion in Florida years ago, and has been working as the live-in general manager at her Manhattan property for the past decade.
‘She loves the sculpture,’ he said, before adding that hundreds of people pause to take photographs of it every day.
On Tuesday morning, the responses from passersby ranged from delight to anger.
Several people pointed and laughed as the effigy rotated eerily in the wind, revealing the First Lady’s face.
A sign taped to the chrysalis reads: ‘I REALLY DON’T sCARE’ – a nod to the inflammatory Zara jacket the First Lady wore during a 2018 trip to a child migrant detention center in Texas
Former First Lady Melania Trump stirred controversy when she wore a jacket with the message ‘I really don’t care. Do u?’ when she went to visit migrant children at the US-Mexico border in June 2018. She claimed in her 2024 memoir that the message was targeting the media
The creator, Kevin Hyman, said he cobbled the Melania-themed Halloween spectacle together in 20 minutes ‘just for fun’, using a furry spider toy from Target and a cocoon from Amazon
Hyman created the dummy on a whim after finding a mask of Melania’s face discarded on the sidewalk five years ago. He said it took 20 minutes to make, and usually lives in the basement
Admirers described the suspended dummy as ‘freaky’ and ‘creative’, with one neighbor saying it was ‘the last thing I’m seeing’ before heading to the polls for early voting in the midterm elections.
However, one elderly resident erupted in fury at the sight of the sculpture. ‘It’s an insult to her, there’s no point in doing something like this,’ she raged to the Daily Mail.
‘This is all hate, and this is not what we should be promoting. There’s been too much vilification of our president, his wife, and his family.’
When asked about the criticism, Hyman said ‘it’s just a Halloween prank’ to him. ‘If people thinks it’s disrespectful, that’s fine,’ he added.
Hyman said the flagpole holding the haunted Melania aloft usually hosts Old Glory, but he also decorates it for other national events, including with the LGBTQ+ rainbow banner during Pride month.
The Upper East Side as a whole goes all-out for Halloween, and Hyman’s neighbors had also turned their brownstones into haunted houses, decked out with witches, ghosts, and spiders.
Though clearly not Melania’s biggest fan, Hyman said he did not intend for the piece to project any specific political missive. ‘I think people can take their own message from it,’ he said
The Upper East Side as a whole goes all-out for Halloween, and Hyman’s neighbors had also turned their brownstones into haunted houses, decked out with witches, ghosts, and spiders
One property nearby has been transformed into an ‘asylum’ complete with skeleton patients
Two blocks away, another Manhattanite had even transformed their property into a creepy ‘asylum’ complete with skeleton patients, beside another home with an Alice in Wonderland themed facade.
However, as the only politically-charged display, Hyman’s seemed to attract the most attention.
He said he expects the haunted Melania will draw in floods of people on Halloween night. ‘I’ll be ready with a bottle of bourbon for any trick-or-treaters,’ he said.
