Painter: Bill Clinton portrait contains a hidden Monica Lewinsky reference.

A painting of former US President Bill Clinton contains a SECRET reference to the Monica Lewinsky dress.

The regal portrait, painted for Washington DC’s National Portrait Gallery, contains a subtle hidden message that’s no longer secret since the artist blabbed about it to a reporter.

Artist Nelson Shanks, who has also painted Princess Diana and Pope John Paul II, revealed the secret to the Philadelphia Daily News.

The painter included a shadow over the fireplace…..which was cast from a BLUE DRESS on a MANNEQUIN.

“I could never get this Monica thing completely out of my mind and it is subtly incorporated in the painting,” Shanks told the newspaper.

“If you look at the left-hand side of it there’s a mantle in the Oval Office and I put a shadow coming into the painting and it does two things. It actually literally represents a shadow from a blue dress that I had on a mannequin, that I had there while I was painting it, but not when he was there. It is also a bit of a metaphor in that it represents a shadow on the office he held, or on him.”

For those of you not following at home, the blue dress is synonymous with the Clinton/Lewinsky affair because it all but confirmed Clinton was lying about “not having sexual relations with that woman”.

(It’s not known if the artists dress had a “protein stain” like the original.)

Shanks said the shadow was “a metaphor in that it represents a shadow on the office he held, or on him.”

“The reality is he’s probably the most famous liar of all time,” he said. “He and his administration did some very good things, of course, but I could never get this Monica thing completely out of my mind and it is subtly incorporated in the painting.”

Clinton, who posed for the painting in 2006, was completely unawares.  The artist sneaked in the mannequin after the POTUS had posed.

You might not otherwise have noticed the shadow cast over the fireplace. But now it’s all we can see.

MORE: Monica Lewinsky was a recluse for years. “I deeply regret what happened“.

But it could have been worse, right?  He could have painted in the actual dress instead of the shadow:

OR snuck in little Mon’s face in the fireplace:

Or Bill could have been wearing the damn thing.  Blue steel in a blue dress:

In any case, it’s fair to say Hillary is probably not thrilled with the whole thing:

THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS ANYMORE, BILL.