This week, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick showed social media his latest purchase: the top tequila bottle. However, a different object in the picture attracted some people in the art world and attracted attention: the painting appears to be Rashid Johnson, whose work is currently under investigation at the Guggenheim Museum.
Johnson, an art star represented by Hauser & Wirth, began the series at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, adapting to a crazy visual vision, his normal loose image of the new global (AB), long-standing “anxious man” painting. Johnson uses red oil rods on cotton, using these abstract agitations to express the fear that defines our 2020 indoor boiling.
The series performed well at auction, with the work leaving the series in the $1 million-$2 million range. Works in the series include the Chicago Academy of Art and the Morgan Library, including the communication of institutions.
Critics quickly noticed the irony of Lutnick, a former businessman appointed by President Donald Trump, and the current scrutiny of his AI deal, possessing the “Anxiety Red” work given the government’s hostile relationship with public health services. “It’s sad, don’t sell art to people like this,” one social media user wrote.
Hauser & Wirth representatives confirmed that the work was Johnson’s work. The spokesman said the painting was not purchased through the gallery, but on the secondary market.
In 2020, Hauser & Wirth sold the series at an online charity auction, with 10% of the proceeds from each sale going to the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund, the same organization that Trump formally withdrew from the first day of the U.S., just like his first term. As outlined by John Hopkins analysis in 2025, withdrawal of commitments has far-reaching consequences for the organization, which monitors and responds to health issues that affect globally and therefore requires international cooperation. The United States is the WHO’s largest contributor (2022-23 at 12% to 15%) and has since stopped funding because WHO’s U.S. personnel were recalled.
The withdrawal is a one-year process that took place in 2025, and has increased in the context of Covid-19 in the United States.
The government has made budget cuts a priority, expanding arts and cultural programs and public health programs: the 2026 presidential budget has proposed cutting nearly 40% of the CDC and Prevention and Prevention and National Institutes of Health budgets. Since Trump took office, the CDC has placed nearly a quarter of its workforce, with about 3,000 employees leaving terminated or voluntarily, even if some officials have recovered in the unclear situation.
Artnews Already contacted Lutnik’s representative.
