The Southern California town of Temecula learned some hard lessons in artistic expression this month after the city yanked paintings from two exhibitions.

The first incident involved local artist Jeff Hebron. His portrait of a nude woman, "Female Study No. 1," which shows (shocking!) a breast and buttocks, was accepted for an exhibition at a city-owned building. But a city employee told show curator Sissi Hale that Hebron's work was inappropriate and could not be shown. Hale was baffled:

"It never occurred to me that Hebron's nude was not family-friendly. If a breast is not family-friendly, then what is: it doesn't get more family-friendly than a breast."

The National Coalition Against Censorship got wind of the removal and admonished the city in a letter (PDF), decrying censorship:

"Simple nudity is not sufficient ground for excluding artwork from public exhibition. If it were, a vast amount of great art, including masterpieces like Michelangelo's David, would be off limits."

Residents and other artists were outraged. So was Press-Enterprise columnist Carl Love. In a recent piece, Love pointed to "local attempts at censorship" over everything from "The Vagina Monologues" to a dictionary's definition of oral sex. He then criticized Temecula officials:

"I know we've been dubbed the 'Bible Belt of Southern California,' the land of conservative values and all that's supposedly right with America, but when are these knuckleheads going to realize that freedom of expression is one of the nation's core values?"

Adding fuel to censorship fire, Temecula artist Lora Sanders said her works were pulled from a library show in January following a letter of complaint. The offending paintings show (horror of horrors!) a man smoking and a man holding a bottle of beer.

The city eventually wrote a letter of apology (PDF) to Hebron on Wednesday. Mayor Jeff Comerchero says the city will look into the library incident, reports the Press-Enterprise.

For more on the Temecula art brouhaha, go to the Press-Enterprise.

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