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Russian NGO blocks entrance to Jock Sturges exhibition in Moscow

If considered in Russia, the works by Jock Sturges could be qualified as crime, the organization’s head, and chair of the Public Chamber’s defense commission, Anton Tsvetkov said

MOSCOW, September 25. /TASS/. The Officers of Russia non-governmental organization has blocked entrance to the exhibition of the U.S. photographer Jock Sturges in Moscow in a protest against promoting his works, the organization’s head, and chair of the Public Chamber’s defense commission, Anton Tsvetkov said on Sunday.

"Yesterday evening, head of the exhibition contacted me telling the pictures, which have aroused public indignation, were not on the exposition. We have agreed that we together with the police will come before the exhibition opens, and together with representatives of the Centre for Prevention of Crime (the NGO’s division - TASS) will study the exhibits to decide what to do," he said. "As yet, our position is as follows: even if the pictures, which caused public indignation, are not here, it is still not quite right only three minutes from the Kremlin, in the very heart of this country, to position this pedophilic photographer."

He continued, saying - if considered in Russia, the works by Jock Sturges could be qualified as crime.

"Right, he could have become famous by good pictures, but remember, this man used to participate in crimes. And he likewise was brought to responsibility also in the United States, though later on was justified. But that is under their legislation, and under our legislation taking pictures of nude children and exposing them is not allowed," he said.

On Saturday, the The Lumiere Brothers Center for Photography, the exhibition’s venue, said they were receiving threats, caused by the exhibition, and chose to close an hour earlier.

Social networks and the media wrote Sturges’ works picturing nude adolescents are pornographic. Russia’s high-ranking legislator Elena Mizulina said the exhibition should be closed at once. The children’s ombudsman Anna Kuznetsova initiated the prosecution’s inspection of the exhibition.

The exhibition began working on September 8. The exposition’s press release reads for many years the photographer had been friendly with families of his models - girls and young women from nudist societies and captures them in the surroundings that are organic to them. "Nudity means nothing to anybody here…People are naked…because they are naturists and spend their summers in a resort dedicated to the absence of shame," he says.