What do you think when you see a sunflower?
Normally I am as pleased as Punch when I see their friendly faces.
But at the moment I am highly irritated because of the attack of the climate activists, who threw tomatoe soup at Vincent van Gogh's painting "Sunflowers". Van Gogh painted them in 1888, in pleasant anticipation of Paul Gaugin's visit, who then was his friend (the visit ended in disaster - think of the ear).
In the German weekly "Die Zeit" Elisabeth Raether wrote that the group "Just Stop Oil" was founded in April 2022 and got donations of 1,1 million Dollar by the US Climate Emergency Fund, which was founded by Aileen Getty, granddaughter of J.P.Getty, the Oil-Tycoon.
"The end justifies the means" says a proverb - yet I do not agree.
In Berlin we have climate protesters who stick themselves on the big motorway Avus - very annoying for the car drivers who have to wait till the police carries off all protesters - but here at least can understand the meaning of the action: cars are heavy polluters.
But why throw tomato soup on a piece of art?
The National Gallery at Trafalgar Square in London is visited each year by millions of visitors (I am one of them and LOVE this museum).
No painting, writes Raether, is insured - because nobody can pay the policy, which would be 1 % of the appraisal value of the paintings.
Two female members of "Just Stop Oil" threw tomato soup at the painting - it was protected by glass, but one can be very happy that the soup did not soak between frame and glass.
Comment of an activist:
"Mostly I was bothered that the soup wasn't vegan".
and another:
"Yes, even if that painting would not have been protected by glass, we would have thought the action to be appropriate. Where is the shock when real sunflowers are destroyed!" said, so Raether, one of the group.
Of course the attackers got much attention. But much turndown too.
Do they really think that because of their action one tree less will be logged in the rainforest? One person more learn about the climate catastrophe? Or change their way of living? Sympathise with them?
Rain forest is irreplaceable, nature and climate too. And I am really concerned, and try to change what I can change.
But art is irreplaceable too.
To think that - to achieve the "good cause" - everything is allowed is a mistake. And history showed that sometimes "a good cause" might spiral up - I think of Frankfurt in 1968 ("Burn, warehouse, burn!") where the argumentation - burning humans in a warehouse should give you the feeling of the napalm-burning people in Vietnam - came up.
The German followers of 'Just Stop Oil', "Die letzte Generation - The Last Generation", now threw mashed potatoes at the painting "Cornrick" by Claude Monet in the museum Barberini in Potsdam and said:
"People starve, people freeze, people die. We are in a climate catastrophe. And all you are afraid of are tomatoe soup or mashed potatoes on a painting."
PS: And beside my anger about trying to destroy works of art it is also THAT self-righteous statement above which makes me angry too:
They KNOW what WE feel or do?
