World
Art accidents, 10 works damaged by clumsy visitors. PHOTO
Ceramic vases from the Qing dynasty in a thousand pieces, jackets stolen from the Picasso Museum in Paris and severed fingers from centenary statues. Testimonials come from museums and art galleries all over the world that remind visitors to pay attention not to ruin unique and unrepeatable pieces: here are some
On Wednesday 4 May 2022 a visitor from Borghese Galleryprobably struck by an illness, fell to the ground hitting the canvas “St. Francis receives the stigmata” from Guido Reni. The work has been damaged: a crack of about four centimeters has opened. The episode, first reported by the Corriere della Serais just one among many clumsy accidents that have ruined precious works of art
In April 2022 a 72 year old lady has stole a blue jacket exposed to Picasso Museum in Paris, mistaking it for a garment hanging on the wall and forgotten by some visitor. In reality the jacket was a work of the Catalan artist Oriol Vilanova. It took some time before anyone noticed the theft: the jacket could be worn by museum visitors
In summer 2020, an Austrian tourist sat on the original plaster cast of the statue by Pauline Bonaparte by Antonio Canovaon display at Gypsotheca Museum of Possagno. The work thus lost two toes. The statue, which had lost its head and other body parts during the bombings of 1917, was restored in 2004