painting

Uh oh…

First story is upsetting.

The second one has a happy ending.

Via Guardian:

A 12-year-old Taiwanese boy lived out a slapstick nightmare at the weekend when he tripped at a museum and broke his fall with a painting, smashing a hole in it.

Footage released by the organisers of the Face of Leonardo: Images of a Genius exhibition in Taipei shows the boy – in shorts, trainers, a blue Puma T-shirt and holding a drink – walk past the still life, catching his foot and stumbling over….

The organisers will not ask the boy’s family to pay for the restoration costs, according to Focus Taiwan news. It said the exhibition organiser, Sun Chi-hsuan, said the boy was very nervous but should not be blamed and the painting, part of a private collection, was insured….

“All 55 paintings in the venue are authentic pieces and they are very rare and precious,” a post on the exhibition’s Facebook page said. “Once these works are damaged, they are permanently damaged.”

But, in a related story with a better ending:

Via ArtNews:

Unlike most stories involving damaged artifacts, a recent accident with a young Israeli girl and a 2,000-year-old vase has an unexpectedly happy ending.

On August 23, the unnamed child and her family were visiting the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, where an exhibition of rare Egyptian, Roman, and Byzantine objects from the Robert and Renee Belfer collection is currently on display.

According to Haaretz, the girl managed to rock the glass case housing the ancient Roman object, causing it to fall and break along a preexisting crack. While the old crack had been previously repaired, according to museum officials, the new repairs have left it in better shape than ever….

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7 Comments | Leave a comment
  1. hbmuzik says:

    A couple thoughts on the boy with the drink tripping…
    1) Why would he be allowed to walk around with a drink–even water–in a museum where paintings are that physically accessible?
    2) Why would a museum ASK for someone to trip by building an “apron” platform in front of a rare and valuable painting? Furthermore, the painting must have been hung really low because it looks like he hit the wall right at waist level.
    Just weird! And dumb! Poor kid… Putting the “moan” in Mona Lisa

  2. Piquerish says:

    Okay, okay. I’m canvassing the neighborhood, trying to come up with some clever tongue-in-cheek crack. I’ll need some time for this. I’ll be back after I wet my pallet.

  3. Alain41 says:

    There’s some doubt about the painting’s authenticity. There’s also a $220 million Da Vinci self-portrait on display. Fingers crossed that that’s better protected. http://news.asiaone.com/news/asia/italian-painting-damaged-taiwan-could-be-fake-expert

  4. The painting is clearly not a DaVinci, but rather a work of the impressionist school; probably a Monet.

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