Environmental protestors took to the Louvre and in an action that would surely leave Mona Lisa without a smile, they threw soup over Leonardo Da Vinci’s most famous lady.
The vandalists were calling for healthy and sustainable food production in France, and are joined by farmers in tractors which have been forming road blockades in recent days.
But it’s not the first time that begrudged people with a cause have taken to vandalising art work as a form of protest, and you can almost guarantee it won’t be the last.
It’s not even the first time in recent years that the Mona Lisa has been vandalised as in May 2022 a 36-year-old man dressed as an old lady in a wheelchair jumped forward and smeared cake over the painting.
A brief look at history tells a story of key political moments being tied to this form of protests.
And with that, here is five times protestors have defamed famous pieces of artwork.
The slashing of the Rokeby Venus
The suffragettes arguably revolutionised the concept of radical protest for a cause and some of the biggest stunts to break early media can be claimed by the protestors in the early 1900s.
Mary Richardson had her part in the protest in March 1914 when she stormed into the London National Gallery and slashed Diego Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus painting with a meat cleaver.
Richardson reportedly did so as a protest for the arrest of suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst
And targeted this painting in particular due to her perception that men would stop and gawp at Venus’s beauty.
The suffragette received a six month sentence in prison for her actions but was released after a few weeks and later became a serial arsonist to keep up with her rebellious activity.
Soup on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers
This list would not be complete without an honourable mention to the protest that took the internet by storm in 2022.
Activists took to the National Gallery in London to fling a can of soup at Van Gogh’s famous image, luckily it wasn’t damaged due to it being encased in protective glass.
The two young protestors also glued their hands to the wall whilst ranting about the cost of living crisis and to urge people to protect the planet.
Just Stop Oil has become infamous for their outrageous protests that garner massive media attention but this is arguably the starting point for their rambunctious vandalism.
Guernica Graffiti
During the Vietnam War Iranian artist Tony Shafrazi spray painted the words ‘kill all lies’ over Pablo Picasso’s artwork ‘Guernica’.
Shafrazi later said this was in protest of the presidential pardoning of the only US Army Official to go on trial for the My Lai Massacre of 1968.
The painting is one of Picasso’s most famous, and the brilliant artist had passed a year prior to the vandalism of his work.
Luckily technicians were able to save the artwork as it had a protective varnish layer on it and it was restored to its full glory just hours later.
The ‘Yellowism’ of Rothko’s Black on Maroon
Mark Rothko was a man known for his deep exploration of colours and intensity in his paintings but the ‘Yellowism’ of his piece Black on Maroon was not what the artist was inviting when painting this piece.
In 2012 the founder of the Yellowism movement, Vladimir Umanets, set upon the Tate Modern to defame the Rothko piece.
Umanets scrawled the words ‘Vladimir Umanets, A Potential Piece of Yellowism’ onto the corner of the iconic piece in a hope to spread the message of his cause.
But what is Yellowism one might ask? The answer is still unclear.
Umanets told the telegraph in 2012: “Yellowism is not art, and Yellowism isn’t anti-art.
“It’s an element of contemporary visual culture. It’s not an artistic movement. It’s not art, it’s not reality, it’s just Yellowism.”
Ultimately the artist/not artist cost the Tate Modern hundreds of thousands of pounds and over 20 months to repair the Rothko piece.
Urmanets faced two years in prison for his criminal damage.
Banksy’s self-shredding art
Finally this list concludes with an artist synonymous with vandalism and political messages but in Banky’s case he destroyed his own work.
The anonymous graffiti artist broke headlines across the world when in 2018 his 2006 piece ‘Girl with Balloon’ was placed on auction at Sotheby’s in London.
The infamous artwork later sold for £1.1 million and in an entirely ‘Banksy’ move it was immediately shredded as soon as it was purchased.
The art work now exists in its destroyed form as a part of a different piece entitled ‘Love is in the Bin’.
Featured Image courtesy of Mario Sánchez Prada on Flickr.
