'Erotic angel' poster for Christmas festival upsets public

Unveiled this weekend by the local Belén society – the association responsible for setting up belenes, or Nativity scenes, around the metropolitan area – artist Manuel Peña's work did not take long in attracting criticism on social media.

Not all the controversy is due to dirty minds, however – the detailed and highly-realistic Baroque profile of the Archangel is, some say, too much of a likeness to FC Atlético de Madrid's player Antoine Griezmann, which they consider blasphemous, either to the Christian religion or to fans of other football teams.

As well as the miniature, lit-up Giralda Tower the angel is holding, some even interpret the wide-open flower on top of it as sexual imagery.

Twitter comments have called it 'horrific', referred to the Archangel's 'dirty expression', 'terrible', 'not ideal for Christmas', 'embarrassing', and compared it to adverts for 'a caberet', 'an Almodóvar film', and 'a gay sauna'.

“Given that time is a precious commodity in Sevilla, we're going to celebrate Christmas and Gay Pride on the same day,” one user said

“The dark side of WhatsApp has been updated for Christmas,” another tweeted.

“Is this for Christmas or for Pride?” one user asked.

This is not the first time a poster advertising campaign has got a city into trouble with the public.

Recently, the centre-northern provincial capital of Zamora (Castilla y León), close to Portuguese border, unveiled a series of posters with 'sexist' jokes in large letters and, underneath, the words: “Violence against women is not a joke. Don't be a part of it.”

Among the least-sickening of the jokes was: “What do you call a woman outside of the kitchen? A tourist.”

Although the city hall said the point was to highlight how sexist jokes are widespread, but are 'not okay', the backlash caused them to change the posters.

They now read: “Are you going to laugh when you hear a sexist joke?” with the previous sub-heading intact.