ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage is making a statement about President Donald Trump, though folks can’t figure out what it is.

“After Trump was elected, I spent days just weeping. And it was really surprising because I’m not a political person,” assistant professor of painting Thomas Chung told KTUU. “I am a social artist. I deal mostly in ideals of culture and global culture but this election bled into that.”

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Chung’s emotional anguish over the 2016 is now in full display in the school’s Kimura Gallery as part of a faculty art exhibition, in the form of a violent painting that’s leaving some visitors scratching their heads.

The image, which is so “graphic or disturbing” the news site issued a viewer’s discretion during the broadcast, depicts a naked Captain America holding Trump’s severed head in his left hand as it drips blood onto a young Hillary Clinton clinging to his leg like a distressed heroine.

To Captain America’s right is a dying bison with the words “Make America White Again” on its body. In the background, other bison leap to their death off a cliff. Captain America is standing on a podium that reads “everything,” and holds a sign in his right hand with a message that appears to be written in blood:

Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself. – Chief Seattle

The painting also includes two eagles on the man’s shoulders, one screaming into his ear.

“It’s an image of the actor who plays Captain America, and two eagles are sort of screaming into his ears, and he’s holding the severed head of Trump, and there’s a young Hillary Clinton clinging to his leg,” Chung explained. “I was reminded of those 80s rock posters, where there’s a woman in tattered clothes clinging to a strong male hero’s leg.”

Former UAA adjunct professor Paul Berger told KTUU he visited the display after a family member brought it to his attention.

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“The painting itself, I kind of found disturbing,” he said. “The image itself was very graphic. So from that point of view, and as a father, trying to explain to my children what the artist is trying to say … (it’s) difficult.”

Berger, a conservative, doesn’t think it’s the type of thing that belongs on display in a publicly funded university.

“Had the roles been reversed, and it was Obama’s head hanging there, I think the outrage would be fantastic,” Berger said. “As a free speech advocate, everyone has a right to express their opinion the way they want to express them. But as a parent and a citizen, there’s a discussion. In a university setting, what’s appropriate?”

“Prior to the election, it was important to the opposing side that we accept, move forward, respect our president and respect the rule of law,” Berger said. “As we raise our kids in our schools, we try to teach them and inculcate them in our civics. Paintings like that, I really think, send a strong, powerful, wrong message to children and students.”

Chung said he struggled with whether or not to display the painting at school because of its political message, but did not explain what that message is supposed to be.

“I was really torn about putting this piece up a faculty show, because I would never talk about my own political beliefs to my students,” Chung said. “I would never push that upon them and make them feel uncomfortable, and so I wondered to myself if putting up this painting was in a way doing that. But I realized that I feel very strongly about this, and I think even students that might be pro-Trump supporters could benefit from having a conversation with me about why I feel this way, why I painted this.”

College officials, meanwhile, are defending the painting and promised to “protect” Chung’s First Amendment rights.

According to Campus Reform:

The UAA Chancellor and President doubled down on the school’s decision to keep the painting in the Kimura Gallery in two emails to the university community. 

Chancellor Tom Case said that the artwork has “sparked spirited discussions on the appropriateness of displaying a piece of art such as this” but is protected expression nonetheless. 

“We understand that some may not support this exhibit, but universities–including UAA–are a place for free exchange of ideas, diversity of thoughts and of opinions, and ideally, a place for conversation to occur around our differences and similarities,” Case wrote. 

University President Jim Johnsen reiterated the school’s commitment to free speech, writing, “A vital and vibrant university, regardless of the campus, must be a place of ideas, opinion, and debate.” 

“Not all ideas, opinions, or artistic expressions stand the test of open debate or time,” he continued. “The dust bin of history is filled with such ideas…I can think of no better place than a university to test ideas, especially those that are highly controversial and objectionable, through open and rigorous debate.”