Vienna museum to welcome art buffs in the buff

Vienna's Leopold Museum said Friday that visitors are welcome to strip off at a special nudist night later this month and admire its popular "Nude Men" exhibition as nature intended. "As there were several requests from nudist associations we decided to give this opportunity to all lovers of the Freikoerperkultur, the Free Body Culture," spokesman Klaus Pokorny told AFP. "Our museum will be a clothes-free zone for one evening" on February 18, he said by email. "Nudists, naturists are welcome!" The Leopold recently extended its "Nude Men" exhibition to run until March 4 after it proved to be a major hit, helping visitor numbers at the museum rise by nearly a fifth in 2012. With interest in nudes in art usually in the female form, what the Leopold calls its "long overdue" exhibition focuses instead of artistic depictions of naked men from 1800 to the present.