Hate mail pours in for Trayvon Martin muralist

Peace Mural Foundation

The Miami artist behind the controversial "We Are All Trayvon Martin" mural says she won't back down despite threats and volumes of hate mail.

"This is not new to me," Huong told the Daily News.

Huong's mural shows a George Zimmerman look-alike blasting a hooded Trayvon Martin as Martin Luther King Jr. bleeds in the background. Martin's face has been replaced by a mirror.

"The person in the hoodie could be you," Huong said. "It could be me."

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Reaction was intense after the unveiling on Friday at the state capitol in Tallahassee, Fla. Hate mail and threats poured in. Huong said she'll respond on Tuesday to each letter through posts on her website, peacemural.org.

Huong said she has explored themes of racism, social justice and peace for 20 years, drawing on her background as a Vietnam War refugee.

"I have an opportunity to explain firsthand what racism means and what injustice means," she said.

A previous series dealing with the Iraq War prompted rounds of criticism as well, although not on the same level as reaction to the 100-foot-long Trayvon mural, Huong said.

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"The Trayvon Martin trial captured the country like no other had since O.J. Simpson," says a description on her website. "It was more than just a heinous crime, it was social injustice."

Huong's latest mural isn't an exact recreation of the February 2012 night Zimmerman fatally shot 17-year-old Martin during a confrontation, she says, but people bring their own views to the piece.

The Zimmerman figure in the painting isn't even the neighborhood watch captain - it's Huong's assistant, the artist said.

"For me, when I set up the mural like this, it's not my voice about the issue," she said, adding that the response was really the "voice of America."

She said she plans to take the mural on the road in the future. She unveiled it in Tallahassee, where she had joined protesters from Dream Defenders, who have camped out for 28 days in an effort to change Florida's "Stand Your Ground" laws.

Huong said she planned to display the mural next in her adopted hometown of Miami.