His photographs grace the Library of Congress and Carnegie Hall and are available for purchase at Amazon.com and other sites. But David Hamilton's images of young nude women and girls are now considered indecent, thanks to a British court ruling in a child porn case.
And at least one of Hamilton's sellers, WHSmith, has withdrawn one of his books, The Age of Innocence, from website sale, after talking the matter over with Hamilton publisher Aurum Press.
Guildford Crown Court ruled that images by Hamilton in the collection of Operation Ore suspect Stanley Loam were indecent images. Surrey police detective Simon Ledger told the court that the claim that the pictures of nude children are artistic is not a valid defense.
Ledger also said the fact that Loam was convicted of child porn possession "demonstrates [Hamilton images] are not legal. Anyone who has David Hamilton's books can be arrested for the possession of indecent photographs." Ledger added that his department was working with Hamilton's publishers to advise them of that possibility.
Loam had been charged with possessing more than 19,000 indecent images of children and told the court his interest was in genuine artistic material, and that the Hamilton images were available over a broad scale from Amazon.com to websites operated by other known and highy reputable booksellers.
"A distinction must be made between eroticism and pornography; the media have blurred the disparity to an unforgivable degree," Hamilton has said, in a quote featured on his own website. "For those intelligent enough to recognize the difference, erotica will continue to hold a unique fascination. Social evils should not be confused with the pursuit of true beauty."
A tip from the U.S. Postal Investigation Service led to a raid on Loam's home as part of Britain's much-discussed anti-child porn operation, Operation Ore. Prosecutors told Guilford Crown Court the images Loam possessed, including the Hamilton images, "are plainly indecent . . . and plainly of a sexual nature."
A Hamilton representative, Glenn Holland, told reporters the 71-year-old photographer and his associates were "deeply saddened and disappointed" by the Loam case ruling.
"David is one of the most successful art photographers the world has ever known. His books have sold millions," Holland continued. "We have known for some time that the law in Britain and the U.S. – our two biggest markets – is becoming tighter each year. But the fact remains that the courts still have to decide on each case."
