Moscow does not believe in underage nudes, even at their most artistic

Within hours of returning to Moscow’s Lumiere Brothers Art Gallery, Jock Sturges’ controversial nude photographs have already been splashed with an unknown liquid. The attack repeats an incident from September 2016, when a member of a far-right movement splashed urine on some of Sturges work being displayed at the same art gallery. Police detained the man responsible for the most recent act of vandalism. According to the newspaper Kommersant, whatever he sprayed was foul-smelling, meaning that Moscow could have another urine-attacker on its hands.

Strangely, security camera footage shows a man dressed in women’s clothing pouring the liquid onto one of Struges’ photos and then quietly moving throughout the exhibition hall, while security guards ignored him.

• In late November, after a year-long review by Russia’s Investigative Committee, officials determined that 32 photos taken by Struges in the 1970s (showing nudist families in France, Ireland, and the U.S.) do not contain child pornography.