News Alert: Heil Hitler Gnome Innocent!

From Ottmar Hörl's website:

"The garden gnome whose arm is raised in a “Heil Hitler” salute has been found not guilty of being a Nazi. The gnome in question is one of about 700 that were featured last year in an exhibit entitled “Dancing With the Devil,” Deutsche Presse-Agentur reports. Found on display in a Nuremberg gallery, the gnome was being investigated by authorities after a viewer complained that it breaks German laws forbidding the use of Nazi symbolism."

"Hörl, a professor at Nuremberg’s Academy of Fine Arts who has created other, friendlier interpretations of the traditional German figure in the past, argued that the piece was clearly mocking the Nazis, who likely would not appreciate being depicted as an army of garden gnomes. Authorities agreed, and dropped the case."