It is an intriguing image. Shot among the birch trees and snow of a Siberian forest, two policemen kiss each other passionately on the lips. They hold and - this is not entirely clear - possibly caress each other's buttocks.
But the work by a Russian art collective has proved too much for Russia's culture minister, Alexander Sokolov. On Monday Mr Sokolov announced that he was banning the photo, entitled Kissing Policemen (An Epoch of Clemency), from an exhibition of contemporary Russian art due to be exhibited in Paris next week.
Mr Sokolov described the photo as political provocation and said he was pulling it, together with 16 other works, from a show at Paris's Maison Rouge exhibition hall. The exhibits were all displayed in Russia this year at Moscow's state-owned Tretyakov gallery.
"If this exhibition appears [in Paris] it will bring shame on Russia. In this case, all of us will bear full responsibility," the minister said. "It is inadmissible...to take all this pornography, kissing policemen and erotic pictures to Paris."
The minister also banned another work by the same irreverent group, Blue Noses, that shows Vladimir Putin, George Bush and Osama bin Laden cavorting on a double bed in their underpants. Customs officers confiscated the montage from a British art dealer last year when he tried to take it to London.
Yesterday artists and critics derided the minister's decision. "The state is beginning to administer culture in the same way it did under Khrushchev," said Alexander Shaburov, one of the two artists in Blue Noses.
Mr Shaburov said that he and fellow artist Viacheslav Mizin had created Kissing Policemen as a homage to the celebrated British graffiti artist Banksy. "We were inspired by Banksy's iconic image of two constables kissing. We wanted to do the same but in Russia," Mr Shaburov said.
The image had nothing to do with gay people, he added. Instead, it was an absurdist fantasy about what might happen if everyone showed mercy and tenderness to each other. "Given the fact the state has banned it, we haven't quite reached this point yet," he noted.
The photo was taken in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk, the artist said. The work was shown at the Tretyakov gallery in February and March, and is now in a small private gallery in Moscow. "There was no scandal when it was shown here in Russia," Mr Shaburov said. "The aim of our work is to take cliches and to make them as absurd as possible. We enjoy taking newspaper headlines and transforming them into something idiotic."
Russia's leader Vladimir Putin is not exactly known for his sense of humour. One of his first acts as president was to ban Russia's version of Spitting Image.
Moscow is home to several world-class art museums including both the New and Old Tretyakov galleries, which have an astonishing collection of 19th century Russian art, as well as the Pushkin, home to impressionist and other masterpieces.
But the little visited museum of state art just next to the Kremlin gives a better idea of current official tastes. It is filled with canvases showing second world war heroes, some legless; politicians; bearded Orthodox priests; and young women wearing flouncy dresses.
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Burly security men look on as artwork is loaded up after the sale. This summer he held a sell-out Los Angeles show featuring other Banksies which saw £3.2 million of art sold in two hours. Of last night's auction, he said: "The idea is to inject a little anarchy back on the staid, serious business of buying art.
Heading for Chez 'Brangelina'? A Banksy is taken to the delivery truck. "There is a whole new set of buyers. Whether they're rag trade, City boys or celebrities, they tend to be under 45. "They've got money and they don't particularly want to spend it on a Picasso - they want to buy something that relates to their lives, their time and their culture."
The expensive pieces were unceremoniously carried out into a backstreet and loaded up into a truck ready to be delivered to their new owners.
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