For some while I have marvelled at the way in which artworks seem to have become the focus of hatred for people wanting to say something banal. If you wish to make a point about politics, the climate or anything else, there are a range of ways to do it. But the least effective must surely be to glue yourself to a painting, throw soup on it or attack it with a knife. Nonetheless, artworks have become the means to communicate certain rote-like messages – with the violence stepping up a notch each time.
It is two years since a couple of morons from Just Stop Oil decided to throw a tin of soup at Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ in the National Gallery. A glass cover protected the painting. In March an anti-Israel protestor spray-painted and then slashed a portrait of Lord Balfour in Trinity College Cambridge. Earlier this month a protestor in Paris stuck an adhesive poster on to Monet’s ‘Coquelicots’ at the Musée d’Orsay. And this week Neanderthals from Just Stop Oil defaced Stonehenge with orange cornflour.
🚨 BREAKING: Just Stop Oil Spray Stonehenge Orange
— Just Stop Oil (@JustStop_Oil) June 19, 2024
🔥 2 people took action the day before Summer Solstice, demanding the incoming government sign up to a legally binding treaty to phase out fossil fuels by 2030.
🧯 Help us take megalithic action — https://t.co/R20S8YQD1j pic.twitter.com/ufzO8ZiDWu
One reason these works of art are chosen is because we notice the action. People talk or write about the latest barbarism, and publicity is just what most extremist groups want. Yet it is also striking that these must be the softest targets imaginable. Indeed, other than strangling a baby panda for publicity, it is hard to think of a softer one.
As I say, if you want to start a debate about something, there are plenty of ways to do it.
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