By 3 News online staff
Rapper Chris Brown is sporting a new tattoo which bears a striking resemblance to what ex-girlfriend Rihanna’s face looked like after he bashed her.
The recently inked portrait appears to show a bruised and beaten face, but his rep is insisting that it is actually a Mexican reference to the celebration of the Day of the Dead.
“His tattoo is a sugar skull and a MAC cosmetics design he saw. It is not Rihanna or an abused woman as erroneously reported,” says the rep.
Sugar skulls are a symbol associated with Dias de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, when Mexicans believe the spirits of loved ones return to this world to reconnect with their families.
Critic Kira Cochrane says in her blog that even if Brown’s tattoo is a Mexican symbol, it is still inappropriate given his past and its resemblance to a beaten woman.
“There’s no doubt the image calls to mind the biggest scandal of his career, looks absolutely like a pummelled woman, and is in those terms absolutely sickening,” she says.
Brown pled guilty to beating Rihanna in June 2009, and has since undergone domestic violence counselling.
3 News