Baby on Nirvana’s ‘Nevermind’ Album Cover Sues Band for Child Sexual Exploitation

The baby from Nirvana‘s famous Nevermind album cover has grown up and is now suing the band for child sexual exploitation. Spencer Elden, who has long claimed to be the naked baby pictured swimming in a swimming pool on the 1991 album cover, has filed a lawsuit against the band’s surviving members as well as Kurt Cobain‘s estate 30 years after the album was released.

Elden claims he could not consent to his image being used on the album because he was only 4 months old at the time of the release and that his legal guardians also didn’t consent. Elden goes further in claiming the image could be considered child pornography and that the band promised to cover his genitals with a sticker on the cover that was never added.

“The images exposed Spencer’s intimate body part and lasciviously displayed Spencer’s genitals from the time he was an infant to the present day,” legal papers filed in California claim, according to the BBC. While non-sexualized photos of babies are generally not considered child pornography under U.S. law, Elden’s attorney argues that the inclusion of the dollar bill in the album art makes him seem “like a sex worker.”

Elden alleges his “true identity and legal name are forever tied to the commercial sexual exploitation he experienced as a minor which has been distributed and sold worldwide from the time he was a baby to the present day.” He claims he has “has suffered and will continue to suffer lifelong damages” as a result of the album cover, including “extreme and permanent emotional distress” as well as “interference with his normal development and educational progress” and “medical and psychological treatment.”

Elden is asking for at least $150,000 from Cobain’s estate and the surviving band members. Representatives for Nirvana and their record labels have yet to respond publicly to these claims. In the past, Elden has recreated the album cover several times as a teenager and adult while wearing swimming trunks but told Time Magazine in 2016 he “got a little upset” about his notoriety as he grew older. “I just woke up already being a part of this huge project,” he said at the time. “It’s pretty difficult – you feel like you’re famous for nothing.”

“It’s hard not to get upset when you hear how much money was involved,” he continued. “[When] I go to a baseball game and think about it: ‘Man, everybody at this baseball game has probably seen my little baby penis,’ I feel like I got part of my human rights revoked.” Elden told The Guardian the previous year that appearing on the album art had “always been a positive thing and opened doors” for him.