Spencer Elden, who was pictured in Nirvana’s ‘Nevermind’ album as a child, claims that the photo constitutes child pornography, filing papers to meet a deadline that can reinstate the lawsuit.
He said that the photo where he is pictured naked in a swimming pool has caused him ”permanent emotional distress,” per BBC.
The band’s lawyers have yet to respond.
According to Pitchfork, Elden claimed that Nirvana, photographer Kurt Weddle and a number of record labels “intentionally commercially marketed the child pornography depicting Spencer and leveraged the lascivious nature of his image to promote the ‘Nevermind’ album, the band, and Nirvana’s music, while earning, at a minimum, tens of millions of dollars in the aggregate.”
The initial lawsuit was filed in August 2021, claiming that his legal guardians never signed a release “authorizing the use of any images of Spencer or of his likeness, and certainly not of commercial child pornography depicting him.”
“This unprecedented album cover is perhaps the first and only time a child’s full-frontal nudity has been used to sell a product,” Elden’s attorneys said, per USA Today. “Spencer’s image constitutes child pornography and each of the Nirvana defendants robbed our client of his dignity and privacy.”
Elden is asking for a trial by jury and $150,000 from each of the 17 defendants — Including former Nirvana members, Courtney Love, the alum's photographer and record companies Universal Music Group, Geffen, Warner and MCA Music.