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Kissing policemen upset the Kremlin

Russia kisses off

Saturday, 13 October 2007

Oooh art. What’s it like? Always in the headlines, constantly annoying people and seemingly happiest when courting controversy. Emin, Hirst, Warhol, Constable, (okay maybe not Constable – nothing headline creating about Dedham landscapes), and Banksy of course. He’s back on the wall of the international media again this week as a Bansky inspired piece irritates those at the Kremlin. Blue Noses are the artists responsible whilst Russia’s culture minister Alexander Sokolov is the Kremlin inhabitant offended. And the image he’s banned? Inspired by Banky’s Brighton kissing policemen Blue Nose recreate the iconic image, only this time with the help of two kissing Russian policemen embracing in a Siberian forest. There’s buttock clenching involved too. No surprise then it was too much for Sokolov who immediately banned the artwork from joining an exhibition of contemporary Russian art due to be exhibited in Paris next week.

Titled Kissing Policemen (An Epoch of Clemency) but tagged by the minister as political provocation Sokolov stated, "If this exhibition appears [in Paris] it will bring shame on Russia. In this case, all of us will bear full responsibility. It is inadmissible to take all this pornography, kissing policemen and erotic pictures to Paris." Shame.

And the Blue Noses view? “It has nothing to do with homosexuality,” said Alexander Shaburov, one of the two Blue Nose artists, but was “an absurdist fantasy about what could happen if everyone showed mercy and tenderness to each other”. "Given the fact the state has banned it,” he continued, “We haven't quite reached this point yet."

Seems someone is getting up the Kremlin’s nose. Tissue anyone?