Stuart Sandford
Medium: Gallery Exhibitin Documentation / Sculpture
Censored by: Instagram
On March 27, 2026 Stuart's account with over 20k followers was disabled from Instagram citing a violation of community standards against fraud and deception, following this post. He was not offered the opportunity to appeal, and had not received a prior warning.
In an effort to reopen his account, Stuart "reached out to the general support@instagram email as well as appeals@instagram and three folk who do/have worked at Meta that friends have connected me with and nothing. Someone suggested I go through the GDPR request and I tried that as well to no avail. My account has been verified for a couple of years now and I have a creator account and have spent money on ads for both Instagram and Facebook so this idea of fraud and deception is extraordinary."
After being highlighted by the campaign ReproUncensored and subsequently a wave of public pressure, Stuart's account was suddenly reinstated without explanation on April 21. This event shows the common event of account removal and reinstatement following public pressure and exposure, without explanation from the company.
Says Stuart: “To be denied access to 15 years plus of friends, family, myriad connections, patrons, and institutions around the world in one fell swoop is egregious behaviour. Artists work hard to build vital networks to disseminate work and, as much as we might not like it, social media and Instagram in particular, is still the first place most people look meaning it’s a vital tool for artists connections with collector and sustaining a practice.”
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stuartsandford/