Police detectives in Adelaide, Australia, confiscated gay artist Robert Mapplethorpe's book "Pictures" from the Folio Foilage bookshop and may file indecency charges, The Australian reported Jan. 10.
"Police viewed the book and believed that some of the photographic images, specifically depicting fists penetrating a human anus, could be within the ambit of a restricted publication," said police spokesman John White.
The art world was stunned by the raid, the newspaper said.
" [ Mapplethorpe ] was one of the most relevant photographers coming out of America in the 1960s and 70s," said Roslyn Oxley of the Roslyn Oxley Gallery in Sydney. "The National Art Gallery in Canberra has hundreds of his works-;he is extremely important in the world context."