Two women wearing ‘Just Stop Oil’ t-shirts threw tomato soup on the famous Van Gogh painting Sunflowers from 1888 and glued themselves to the wall at London’s National Gallery on Friday night.
The vandal-protestors chanted, “What is worth more, art or life? Are you more concerned about the protection of a painting or the protection of our planet and people?” after their ‘direct-action’ stunt.
Activists with @JustStop_Oil have thrown tomato soup on Van Gogh’s Sunflowers at the national Gallery and glued themselves to the wall. pic.twitter.com/M8YP1LPTOU
— Damien Gayle (@damiengayle) October 14, 2022
The National Gallery said the protesters have caused “minor damage to the frame but the painting is unharmed”.
Statement from the National Gallery pic.twitter.com/DuZhTbAvbH
— National Gallery (@NationalGallery) October 14, 2022
Environmental protesters aim to end UK government involvement in oil and gas and have spurred a series of high-profile protests.
The Just Stop Oil campaign group also posted a video on Friday showing the two activists throwing two tins of soup over the painting before gluing themselves to a wall.
They were arrested for criminal damage and aggravated trespassing.
The local police said, “Specialist officers have now un-glued them and they have been taken into custody at a central London police station”.
Van Gogh had created seven versions of Sunflowers in total and five of them are on public display in museums and galleries across the world, including at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam which said it is keeping “a close eye on developments” that might affect its own security measures.
The National Gallery, which has some of the greatest collections of paintings in the world, said Sunflowers, which was painted in 1888, was one of its most popular attractions.
It says on its website: “It is the painting that is most often reproduced on cards, posters, mugs, tea-towels and stationery. It was also the picture that Van Gogh was most proud of”.
Other Glue Attacks
Just Stop Oil has previously targeted several other famous paintings with glue attacks.
In June, two activists glued their hands to the frame of Van Gogh’s painting Peach Trees in Blossom at the Courtauld Gallery in London.
In July, supporters glued their hands to the frame of British painter John Constable’s The Hay Wain at the National Gallery.
They first taped the canvas over with a ‘reimagined version’ of the bucolic scene, showing the landscape covered in pollution, dotted with wildfires, and overflown by aircraft.
In the same month, they glued themselves to a full-scale copy of Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Last Supper at the Royal Academy in London.
In recent days, Just Stop Oil has held multiple protests blocking highways.
Experts have predicted that acts of ‘climate sabotage’ will increase as extreme weather events such as droughts, wildfires, and storms increase and the urgency to act grows.
