“I was getting referred to their managers and their lawyers. “I was asking if they wanted to put a piece of art in the fucking thing,” he said. (The lawyers representing the defendants did not immediately respond to Artnet News’s request for further comment.)Įlden, a painter who once interned for artist Shepard Fairey, explained in a 2016 interview with GQ Australia that his view on the photograph changed after he reached out to Nirvana to see if the band would participate in an art show he was putting on. While they disputed that the image constitutes child sexual abuse material, they noted that the statute of limitations on Elden’s c laim for such a violation would have expired in 2011-two decades after the album’s release. “He has re-enacted the photograph in exchange for a fee, many times he has had the album title… tattooed across his chest he has appeared on a talk show wearing a self-parodying, nude-colored onesie he has autographed copies of the album cover for sale on eBay and he has used the connection to try to pick up women,” the lawyers wrote.

The motion also pointed out that, for much of his life, Elden celebrated his connection to the band-and even profited from it. Nudity, they argued, must come with “other circumstances that make the visual depiction lascivious or sexually provocative” to be considered child pornography. They explained that, if Elden’s theory were accurate, anyone who owned a copy of the record would could be charged with felony possession of child pornography. “Elden’s claim that the photograph on the Nevermind album cover is ‘child pornography’ is, on its face, not serious,” the legal representatives for the band said in their motion to dismiss the case last month. Nirvana’s team, meanwhile, remains steadfast that the suit has no merit. Spencer Elden recreates his pose from the cover of Nirvana’s album Nevermind, shot when he was a baby, 25 years later.

What does nirvana nevermind cover mean