THE CHAIRMAN of a flagship North-East gallery at the centre of a police investigation has spoken out in defence of staff who called in police to see if an exhibit breached pornography laws.

Northumbria Police seized a photograph called "Klara and Edda belly-dancing" by Nan Goldin, after being called in by the management of Gateshead's Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art on Thursday last week.

The photograph was on of 139 photos in a Goldin exhibit owned by Sir Elton John.

Chairman Sir Ian Wrigglesworth last night praised staff, who he said "did the right thing" by alerting police.

A spokesman for Sir Elton said the photograph, of two naked young girls, had been exhibited around the world without objections. It is of a young girl wearing underpants and a see-through skirt standing over a younger girl, who is naked and lying back with her legs open and was shot in Berlin in 1998.

Northumbria Police is now investigating and is taking preliminary advice from the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

Mr Wrigglesworth said: "We had an exhibition of 139 photographs and the management of Baltic thought this particular one was possibly beyond the pale.

"So the management took advice from the police as to whether it should be put on display or not.

"When that doubt was raised about this particular one, advice was taken and I think the management behaved extremely responsibly, and did what most people in the public would want them to do.

"That led to a police investigation, which is ongoing."

A statement on Sir Elton John's website said the image was from a monograph of the American photographer's works entitled "The Devil's Playground" and was part of the Thanksgiving exhibition The work was offered for sale at Sotheby's in New York in 2002 and 2004, and has been exhibited in Houston, London, Madrid, New York, Portugal, Warsaw and Zurich.

A spokeswoman for the Matthew Marks Gallery - the New York art house which represents Nan Goldin said yesterday: "We don't know anything about this at this point. I wish I had more information for you but I can't help."