“A man dressed as an old lady jumps out of a wheelchair and attempted to smash the bulletproof glass of the Mona Lisa. Then proceeds to smear cake on the glass and throws roses everywhere, all before being tackled by security,” wrote Lukeee, a Twitter user who posted a video of a Louvre museum staff wiping the painting’s glass case after the incident.
It was a shocking scene for everyone else at the museum, seeing somebody try to destroy Leonardo da Vinci’s most famous painting.
It seemed that Mona Lisa’s enigmatic smile did not work its magic on the vandal, who was more focused on attracting public attention to his protest against artists.
Speaking in French, the man who was arrested for his act of vandalism uttered, “There are people who are destroying the Earth … All artists, think about the Earth. That’s why I did this. Think of the planet.”
After his arrest, the police authorities put the vandal under psychiatric care and an investigation into the incident was opened according to the prosecutor’s office.
Even though many visitors at the museum had taken photos and video footage of someone cleaning the Mona Lisa’s glass case after the cake smearing, the vandalism caught everyone in surprise that no one was able to capture the incident on camera.
But then, it was not the first time that somebody had tried to destory the world-famous painting. In 1956, a man from Bolivia threw a rock at the Mona Lisa which caused damage to her left elbow.
Then, in 2009, a female visitor from Russia viciously threw an empty teacup at the painting. It was a good thing that the Mona Lisa has been already placed in a bullet-proof glass since 2005, and only the case sustained a scratch.
Nevertheless, da Vinci’s masterpiece at the Louvre continues to attract thousands of visitors every day, enthralled by Mona Lisa’s mysterious gaze and smile regardless of what some people think.
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