SAINT PETERSBURG (AFP).- Russian police have raided an erotica museum in Saint Petersburg and confiscated a painting showing a naked Vladimir Putin with an erect penis squaring off at his equally naked US counterpart Barack Obama, a curator said Wednesday.

The raid on the museum, which describes itself as one of the largest erotica museums in Europe, took place Tuesday night ahead of Obama's expected arrival in Russia's second city to take part in the G20 summit later this week.

The museum's curator Alexander Donskoi said the museum was temporarily shut down, suggesting that the gesture was political.

"I do not understand why it's necessary to mix arts and politics?" he told AFP.

Besides a vast array of erotic paraphernalia, the museum featured a picture dubbed "The Standoff between Russia and America."

The painting shows muscle-bound images of Putin and Obama facing each other with massive erect penises and their fists raised.

Late last month police raided another exhibition in Saint Petersburg, confiscating a painting that portrayed Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev lounging together in women's lingerie.

After the raid the painting's author fled to France where he is applying for asylum.



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