10 famous works of art that were ruined by people (14 photos)

31 May 2024

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Let's take a look at a few famous creations that got their due from people who became famous in some sense.

You probably hear news from time to time about how some activists throw paint or otherwise attack works of art in galleries. Nowadays, most objects of painting or sculpture that are truly valuable to humanity are protected from people by special impenetrable glass, which all self-respecting museums in the world have acquired. Such measures are absolutely justified, because over the past decades and centuries, many cases have been recorded when activists or, first of all, vandals (most often, insane) damaged famous creations, causing them serious injuries, because of which fragile objects had to be restored. Fortunately, they are now coping with this extremely skillfully.

Some "attacks" on works of art have become part of their legacy, even if there are no visible "scars" left on them. The same “Mona Lisa” gained a new round of popularity after its abduction and return at the beginning of the last century. There was no major damage, but not everyone is so lucky.

“Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan November 16, 1581”, Ilya Repin

The 1885 painting was attacked twice by vandals. In 1913, icon painter Abram Balashov hit the canvas three times with a knife. Because of what happened, the curator of the Tretyakov Gallery of those years, the painter Georgy Khruslov, threw himself under a train. Ilya Repin himself arrived at the gallery to inspect the damage and was sure that the painting was forever damaged, but later actively participated in the restoration.

In 2018, an unknown man hit the painting with a metal fence post, breaking the protective glass, which damaged the painting in three places. The painting was also restored a second time.

Portland Vase

A masterpiece of Roman glassmaking, located in the London Museum, was broken in 1885 by the deranged William Lloyd, after which restorers had to literally assemble the puzzle. Different specialists were involved in gluing the particles together several times, and the vase was finally restored only in 1989. That is, it took more than a hundred years!

"Night Watch", Rembrandt

In 1975, an unemployed history teacher, later declared insane, left long cuts in the painting. The canvas was restored in 4 months, but marks are still visible on it.

"Woman in a Red Chair", Pablo Picasso

In 2012, a man, using a stencil and a can of spray paint, applied an image of a bull with a bullfighter and the inscription “Conquista” to the painting. The vandal claimed he did it out of respect for Picasso, but was still sentenced to two years in prison. The canvas itself was quickly restored.

"The Little Mermaid", Copenhagen

The unfortunate “Little Mermaid” is a favorite of vandals. Located in an open, unprotected location in the port of Copenhagen, the statue is regularly attacked. What did they do with her? They poured paint and wrote different words, cut off the head and other parts of the body. It was even blown up! This is not to mention the tracks left by birds and natural changes, since the statue was installed in 1913.

But every time “The Little Mermaid” is cleaned, the missing parts are attached and returned back. The city authorities are ready to restore it an infinite number of times, since the local State Museum of Fine Arts stores a plaster cast of the original “Little Mermaid”, with which restorers compare new versions of hands and heads.

Venus with a Mirror, Diego Velazquez

In 1914, Venus received seven visible cuts to her back from British suffragette Mary Richardson, who, according to her, wanted to destroy the most beautiful woman in mythology, as authorities arrested her colleague Emmeline Pankhurst - according to Richardson, the most beautiful woman of our time.

The canvas was restored—cuts in paintings can be repaired quite easily by restorers. But acid is a completely different matter.

"Danae", Rembrandt

The painting is in the Hermitage. In the collage, she is before and after Lithuanian Bronius Majgis doused her with acid in 1985, later, of course, declared insane. It took 12 years to restore the painting.

The network has an atmospheric report from those times from the Vremya program about the consequences of an act of vandalism and the process of restoration of the painting.

“Three Figures”, Anna Leporskaya

In 2022, a security guard at the Yeltsin Center in Yekaterinburg, where the painting was exhibited, on his first day of work drew eyes on two of the three figures with a ballpoint pen. He later said that he thought the 1930s work from the Tretyakov Gallery was a drawing of teenagers looking at the painting and laughing at the fact that the figures had no eyes.

"Sailing Boat at Argenteuil", Claude Manet

In 2012, a certain Andrew Shannon simply hit the painting with his fist (!), causing noticeable damage to it, which was repaired in 18 months. The man received 5 years in prison.

"Pieta", Michelangelo

In 1972, the late fifteenth-century statue was attacked by Australian geologist Laszlo Toth. Shouting “I am Jesus Christ, I am risen from the dead!” the man struck several times with a rock hammer, damaging Madonna's face and breaking off her hand. The Vatican, where the statue is located, even considered the idea of leaving the face with chips to testify to the spiritual flaws of the era, but in the end the sculpture was completely restored. Moreover, the restorers used only the “original” fragments of the Pietà, which were collected around the statue after the incident.