BP protesters oil and feather Tate

LONDON, June 30 (UPI) -- A group of artists calling themselves The Good Crude Britannia threw oil and feathers at the Tate Britain to protest the museum's acceptance of BP sponsorship.

The BBC said the demonstrators vandalized the building's entrance and called for its administrators to sever ties with BP in the wake of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

An open letter signed by more than 170 members of Good Crude Britannia and calling the BP logo "a stain on the Tate's international reputation" was published in Monday's Guardian newspaper, the BBC said.

"These relationships enable big oil companies to mask the environmentally destructive nature of their activities with the social legitimacy that is associated with such high-profile cultural associations," the letter reads.

Tate Britain issued a statement to the BBC describing BP's support as "instrumental in helping Tate develop access to the Tate Collection and to present changing displays of work by a wide range of artists in the national collection of British art."