Jock Sturges, various images / urine

On Sunday, September 25, 2016, a visitor used urine to attack a series of framed images on display at the Lumiere Brothers Center for Photography in Moscow.

Following senator Yelena Mizulina’s condemning of Sturges’ exhibition “No Embarrassment” as “propaganda of paedophilia” (it included images of naked school-age girls), the exhibition was stormed by a group of men from Officers of Russia, a public organization which says it unites more than 100,000 veteran and active military officers. During their “occupation,” an unidentified man (who’d gained entry by claiming to be a journalist) sprayed what appeared to be urine from a plastic bottle; it was unclear whether the man was a member of the Officers or was acting on his own volition.

In the wake of the incident, the gallery closed down the exhibition. The images themselves do not appear to have been damaged.