European foreign policy of the Barack Obama administration signal to the Muslim world and firmly anchor the country in Europe. The trip marked Obama's first visit to a Muslim majority country. Obama has asserted that a close relationship with a stable, democratic, Western-oriented Republic of Turkey is an important U.S. national interest. His administration declared that the U.S. will support the promotion of democracy, human rights, and freedom of expression in Turkey and support its efforts to join the European Union, which the president confirmed on his April visit. While Obama has gone on the record in the past as referring to the massacre of Armenians under the
President Barack Obama (painting) President Barack Obama (painting) President Barack Obama is a 2018 portrait of Barack Obama by the artist Kehinde Wiley for the National Portrait Gallery. In October 2017, it was announced that Wiley had been chosen by Barack Obama to paint an official portrait of the former president to appear in Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery "America's Presidents" exhibition. The painting depicts Obama sitting in a chair seemingly floating among foliage. The foliage is described by the author as "chrysanthemums (the official flower of Chicago), jasmine (symbolic of Hawaii where the president spent most of his childhood) and African blue lilies (alluding