Artist Charles Billich’s brush with Covid-19

Charles Billich’s star-crossed visit to the US to meet Donald Trump has taken another turn for the worse, with the prominent Sydney artist and his wife both in hospital with Covid-19.

Christa and Charles Billich in December.

Charles Billich’s star-crossed visit to the US to meet Donald Trump has taken another turn for the worse, with the prominent Sydney artist and his wife both in hospital with Covid-19.

Billich, 87, was admitted over the weekend while wife Christa, 76, was rushed to an emergency room with breathing difficulties.

The painter’s daughter, Eliza, said the family was trying to establish what could be done to help the elderly couple. Billich has a heart condition and Christa is battling leukaemia.

Each of them is double vaccinated and received the Covid booster before flying out last week, but their age and underlying health issues put them especially at-risk.

In a brief call, Christa Billich said her symptoms had come on abruptly, evidently from the virus. She was on oxygen and had been given antiviral medication.

“He is getting a bit better,” she said of her husband. “I started two days after him.”

They had flown to Florida to attend Mr Trump’s new year’s eve party at his Mar-a-Lago estate, where Charles Billich was to have presented the ex-president with a painting.

But the tight security around him prevented Billich from handing over the 24-carat gold-embossed canvas. Instead, lunch was arranged with Mr Trump at his beach house.

Billich fell sick on Saturday, forcing this to be cancelled. Christa initially tested negative but was taken to hospital from their Palm Beach hotel on Sunday night “I am having problems getting enough air,” she said.

Eliza Billich, 56, said the family had been told her father was through the worst, while Christa was struggling.

“They have said he will be on the upside in about three days,” she said. “We’re just glad they’re both being looked after.”

The colourful couple had seemed to be at their flamboyant best at Trump HQ last Friday to see in the new year, rubbing shoulders with insiders such as Roger Stone, who was pardoned by Mr Trump in one of his last acts in the White House.

Billich, who already has a cityscape of Washington hanging there, was photographed mingling near Mr Trump.

The painting expressed his admiration for the 45th US president, imagining his visage as the fifth to grace the Mt Rushmore monument alongside those of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.

Eliza Billich said they must have been infected at “that silly party” at Mar-a-Lago – though this seems unlikely, given the minimum known incubation period for the now-dominant Omicron variant is 72 hours.

She said the family was deeply concerned, and keen to get them home. “Look, anything could happen, couldn’t it? They could say my father will be OK, but you never know.

“Considering they have both had all of the vaccine and the booster I am surprised they have been hit so badly.”

Christa said they hoped to find a way to finally get the painting to Mr Trump.