Police said a man who robbed a convenience store early Friday wore a white bunny head with the face cut out.

LONDON — A major exhibition by 11 Los Angeles artists was postponed at Hayward Gallery here Thursday in a controversy involving titled officials, a show business star, the press, and a people who pride themselves on their love for animals.

An international flap over fish.

Artist Newton Harrison's "Portable Fish Farm" is an ecological work about growth and life cycles. Six large tanks contain lobster, crayfish, oysters, brine shrimp and catfish, dominating a large upper room of the government-owned gallery.

The catfish—200 of them—were shipped here live from El Centro, Calif. Harrison wanted to demonstrate man's ability to haul food great distances and harvest it in a new environment. Some catfish were to lay eggs; some were to mature during the showing. Others were to be cooked at an opening feast for 250 guests, to prove Harrison's idea that "all art is about survival."

Fish, to be cooked, must be killed. Harrison wanted people to see the process as part of his exhibition.

The killing part hooked the British press. Advance stories ignored almost everything except the "ritual execution" of catfish. That news triggered a reaction nearly incomprehensible outside animal-loving England.

Confused readers called papers to protest the "bludgeoning" of innocent cats. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was moved to "deplore" any public catfish killing.

British comedian Spike Milligan, famous for his work on "The Goon Show," carried his protest to the gallery itself. He threw a hammer through the front window Thursday morning.