U.S. POLITICS
Sketch artist Isabelle Brourman tells Newsweek what it was like covering the former president’s court case
THERE WAS A NONSTOP PARADE of recognizable faces at former President Donald Trump’s criminal trial. On the witness stand, in the audience and in the overflow room, high-profile figures, Trump allies and even primetime news anchors made an appearance at 100 Centre Street in New York City.
But the best-dressed person in the courtroom was not among that crowd. Instead, she was one of three court sketch artists who spent their days scribbling on large canvases, documenting the historic criminal trial—and eventual conviction—of a former U.S. president. Isabelle Brourman—who often sported a large, bedazzled headband and tights that made her legs look like they were covered in tattoos—spent five weeks inside the courtroom, diligently caricaturing the ex-president and the rotating cast of characters.
From star witness Michael Cohen to members of Trump’s entourage— including Lara Trump and Representative Lauren Boebert—Brourman not only tried to capture who was in the courtroom, but also the feeling of being in that room on the 15th floor of the Manhattan Criminal Court.
“People ask me, ‘What’s it like? How are you doing?’
And those are things that we don’t really consider when we’re looking back on historic documents. What were people feeling in the room?” she told Newsweek during a live interview at her studio, before the trial ended.
Her vibrant, collage-like images are unconventional. Unlike the other court sketch artists who paint snapshots of the trial, Brourman fills her canvases with overlapping images of the defendant, witnesses, exhibits of evidence, quotes from the attorneys and, in one work, even the plastic bag that her lunch came in.
“It said, ‘Thank you for your business,’” she said. “It was the day that Jeffrey McConney was on the stand, and I thought that was kind of perfect because he was the former controller [of the Trump Organization].”
Within the layers of her sketches, observers have seen the various members of the Trump family who have accompanied the patriarch to his trial. Brourman said they’re all “fun” to draw because they’re “kind of action figure-y and ready for TV.” She said she particularly enjoyed drawing Trump’s son Eric, who became a mainstay in the front row behind his father, because of his eyes.
“He has a forehead that sort of creates a darkness in his eyes, so getting that right and the mood of his face is fun for me and it sort of matches the mood in the room, something that’s looming,” Brourman said. “Don Jr., he’s more of a showman. He comes in and his shoulders are back really far and his head is tilted up, his chin is up, his nose is up. He has an attitude that is comp
