Michael Brown Sr.: Chicago Art Exhibit On Son's Death "Disgusting"
(CBS) -- It's art imitating life that some say goes too far.
A graphic exhibit of the shooting death of Ferguson teen Michael Brown by a white police officer is on display in Chicago. Even Brown's father won't view it.
CBS 2's Mike Parker reports the art gallery on East 47th Street is the now at the center of a controversy. The owners have received hate mail and threats about one of their exhibits.
It graphically recalls a shooting death that exploded across the nation last year.
The exhibit is a white artist's re-creation of Michael Brown's lifeless body lying face down, uncovered, as part of a Chicago exhibit on white privilege.
It is stark and shocking and it has had a profound effect on his father.
"I really, really would like them to take that away," Brown said. "I think it's really disturbing, disgusting. I keep the thought, that thought, that picture is still in my head."
The owners of the Gallery Guichard say they have no intention of covering up or removing the exhibit without first discussing it with the artist.
"The installation doesn't say it's for or against any side," said owner Andre Guichard. "It really just says now that he has left us, he's an angel."
Indeed part of the exhibit is a video of singer Eartha Kitt, singing "Angelitos Negros."
"I have no problem with the person that created that but I think they should have reached out to both sides of the family," Brown said.
Michael Brown's mother was at the exhibit's opening last week, but asked that the depiction of her dead son's body be covered while she was there.
Ti-Rock Moore, the white artist who designed the exhibit, told the Guardian newspaper: "We're living in a society of very complicated systems that create advantages for white people, and disadvantages for others. That's what my work is about."
