“We’re scared because scientists tell us we won’t be able to feed our families after 2050,” said one of the two activists behind the action.
After the soup on a Van Gogh, the porridge on a Monet. The German-Austrian Last Generation civil disobedience movement shared a video on Twitter this Sunday afternoon showing two activists throwing mashed potatoes at the painting Les Meules by French Impressionist painter Claude Monet on display at the Barberini Museum in Potsdam, Germany. According to the public broadcaster RBB, the work, which is protected by glass, was not damaged during this action.
“People are starving, freezing, people are dying. We’re living in a climate catastrophe. And all you’re afraid of is tomato soup or mashed potatoes on a blackboard,” one of the two activists launched their hands on the wall under the painting afterwards.
Then he added: “You know what we’re afraid of? We’re scared because scientists tell us we won’t be able to feed our families after 2050. Does it take mashed potatoes on a board to make you listen? Painting is worthless if we have to fight for food.”
A painting was sold in 2019 for 112 million euros
The painting The Millstones targeted by the two activists this Sunday is part of a series of 25 works created by Claude Monet between 1890 and 1891. In 2019, the painting on display in Potsdam was sold for $110.7 million (€112 million) to an anonymous seller at auction. Since then it had been exhibited in the German city.
“My heart stopped beating when I heard about this action,” the spokeswoman for the Barberini Museum told RBB, adding that it was the most expensive Monet painting ever sold.
Potsdam’s Mayor Mike Schubert criticized the activists’ action on Twitter. “This is cultural barbarism, not a political expression. You are undermining your intentions,” he wrote.
Hunger strike in front of the Reichstag
On October 14, two British climate activists became known for their project the tomato soup in Vincent Van Gogh’s painting Sunflowers, exhibited at the National Gallery in London (UK) and also protected by glass. “Are you more concerned with protecting a painting or protecting our planet and its inhabitants?” They asked, like the Potsdam activists.
The Last Generation movement is used to acts of civil disobedience. As the Guardian recalls, some of its members went on a hunger strike outside the Reichstag in Berlin last year, citing German leaders’ climate inaction to justify their action.
Earlier this year, other members of the movement taped their hands to the tarmac of one of Germany’s busiest autobahns.