Petro Poroshenko's The Economist Cover

About

Petro Poroshenko's The Economist Cover is a photoshop meme that became popular after the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, tweeted a cover of an annual book released by the magazine The Economist where his face had been photoshopped over the face of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Origin

On December 1st, 2016, the Economist, a political and financial magazine, released their annual book, which contains their predictions and explorations of world issues in the new year.^[2] The cover featured a series of portraits of world leaders arranged in the foreground, with other figures arranged in the background. Second from right, in the first row, was Russian President Vladimir Putin. In early January, 2016, Petro Poroshenko, the President of the Ukraine allegedly tweeted a photo of a photoshopped copy of the book in which his face had been photoshopped to replace Putin's, and the year had been changed to 2017. The accompanying text read "Some of the gifts are not perceived as a compliment, but as a personal responsibility." The tweet was later deleted.^[2]

Spread

Soon after the original tweet, on January 3rd and 4th, Russian users began photoshopping Poroshenko into other magazine covers or situations where he could be seen as having an inflated self-worth,^[3] including substituting the Ukranian president for world figures like Yuri Gagarin (the Russian first man in space), Caitlyn Jenner (the first transgendered person to be on the cover of Vogue, and adding his face to the moon and Mount Rushmore. The edit trend was covered worldwide, in both Russian-language and English-language news sources.^[4]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References