Paris museum says painting was target of attempted attack

A young woman attempted to throw soup at a world-famous artwork in the Musee d'Orsay

Powered by automated translation

A young woman tried to throw soup at a painting at the world-famous Musee d'Orsay in Paris this week, the museum confirmed on Sunday, in a similar attack to others by climate activists in Europe.

Scroll through the gallery above to see photos of other protests in museums and art galleries

The museum refused to say which painting was targeted, but it is home to works by some of the most famous European artists, including Paul Cezanne, Paul Gauguin, Vincent van Gogh, Edouard Manet and Claude Monet.

The museum revealed it had filed a legal complaint for the "attempt to damage a piece of work" after the female activist was intercepted on Thursday, confirming a report in Le Parisien daily.

The Paris prosecutor's office said police had opened an investigation after the complaint.

According to the French newspaper, the woman had initially tried to approach the 1889 Van Gogh self-portrait at Saint-Remy, before attempting to throw soup at a painting by Gauguin.

The daily reported she was wearing a Just Stop Oil T-shirt, as others have worn during similar stunts in recent weeks.

On Sunday, two environmental activists glued themselves to metal poles supporting a dinosaur skeleton that was more than 60 million years old at Berlin's Natural History Museum to protest Germany's climate policies.

And also on Thursday, climate activists glued themselves to Johannes Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring at the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague, Netherlands.

Environmental activists splashed tomato soup on Van Gogh's Sunflowers at the National Gallery in London earlier this month, while others threw mashed potato over a Monet painting at the Barberini Museum in Germany.

As the attacks increase in number, French Culture Minister Rima Abdul Malak has urged national museums to "redouble their vigilance".

Updated: October 31, 2022, 4:38 AM