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Muammar Al-gaddafi has reportedly approached the New York Times about the possibility of the Metropolitan Museum of Art doing a fashion exhibit about him.

Horacio Silva of the New York Times was recently sent a letter by a member of Libya's Culture and Ethnic Affairs office, asking if Silva would like to journey to Libya in order to inspect the clothes collection of the Libyan dictator.

"We would like to offer you the opportunity, Mr. Horacio," the letter reads, "when it is convenient to do so to be our guest for an all expenses paid trip to Tripoli and peruse our President's collection with a view to curating a stylish retrospective of his fashion highlights at the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum in New York."

The letter is signed by Zainab Bint Abu Talib, an aide to Mr. Moussa Khalid Wahabb, the new Minister for Cultural Affairs in Libya. The letter is six pages long, with four of those pages being "reference shots" of Gaddafi in various costumes.

The letter, if legitimate, comes at a bizarre time, as NATO forces are fighting alongside Libyan rebels against Gaddafi's forces. Yesterday it was reported that two NATO airstrikes had struck Gaddafi's compound, taking out his library and administrative offices.

Gadaffi is famously eccentric, and his garish fashions have long been celebrated and mocked online. Still, this would be a strange move even for him.

The letter does include some references to the current conflict, ending with, "Obviously there is urgency in your response. We have been suffering many outages at the Ministry with peak body ramifications. Yet with backup generators at the new consolidated headquarters now running more reliably, all contact appliances are in full working order."

Silva did not reveal if he had actually written back, but in a Times column headlined "Off Pitch," he expressed regret about not being able to go.

"Would that I could play in Muammar el-Qaddafi's closet," Silva wrote. "Sadly, The Times's editorial policy prohibits me from taking this trip."