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Nude art clothed in protest against China's Internet crackdown

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Chinese Internet users angered by censorship in cyberspace have dressed up images of famous renaissance nudes in a protest against Beijing's crackdown on "vulgar" online content.

Images posted as part of the protest include Michelangelo's statue "David" shown in a Mao suit while black socks and a strategically placed necktie were added to the artist's depiction of Adam on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

The protest began last week after a user of the social networking site Douban.com complained that images of several paintings, including Titian's nude "Venus of Urbino," had been deleted from an online photo album. According to blogs on the site, Douban's administrators had told the user that posting pornography would endanger the site's operations. In response, protest's organisers asked Internet users to clothe artwork to "save" it from the censors, who have shut down 1,635 websites and 200 blogs in a one-month campaign against content that "harms public morality." The protest are not limited to 16th century art -- one Internet user drew red underpants on the leaning, joined towers of state-run China Central Television's headquarters in Beijing. The protest organisers were cautious, however, advising participants not to depict China's political leaders in any of their images.

"Netizens in China are becoming more and more innovative in their ways of protesting against censorship authorities' arbitrary use of power," blogger Catherine Yeung wrote in a comment on the protest campaign. The protest had an almost immediate effect. By Thursday, the Shanghai user whose renaissance album started the controversy said Douban had allowed the deleted paintings to be shown in their original form. Although the link to the Douban-hosted site showcasing the revised art was not working Sunday,

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