BEIJING, China (Reuters) -- A Chinese culture ministry official has denounced a university professor who stripped naked in front of students and teachers during an art class, a Chinese newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Mo Xiaoxin, a 56-year-old assistant professor at a university in Changzhou, in eastern Jiangsu province, shocked students by stripping during a lecture on "body art" to emphasize the "power" of the body and to "challenge taboos," the Beijing News said.

"There are no taboos in the field of research, but to do this directly in the course of teaching is obviously not appropriate," the paper quoted Tian Junting, a culture ministry official, as saying.

The lecture was part of a course within a newly established "human body art and culture" research institute -- China's first -- at Jiangsu Teachers University of Technology, the paper said.

Mo arranged for four other models, including a man and woman in their 70s or 80s, and a younger couple, to strip naked in front of the class while he lectured, the paper said.

During the nearly hour-long class, Mo also invited students to take their clothes off.

"Professor Mo appeared emotionally excited at the time," the paper quoted a student as saying. "As he was talking, he undid his belt and took off his pants, and stood naked in the middle of the lecture podium."

The naked lecture made many of the 30 or so students feel "uneasy," the paper said. "Some kept their eyes trained on the ceiling, some awkwardly bowed their heads and stared at the ground".

Tian, the culture ministry official, said the course was still in a "research phase" and it wasn't yet known whether it had produced "positive or negative effects."