They vandalized a Gustav Klimt painting with black liquid on an event sponsored by an Austrian oil company

Environmental activists sprayed this Tuesday with a black liquid the famous painting “Death and Life” by the Austrian painter Gustav Klimtreported the Leopold Museum of vienna.

“Unfortunately we were the victims of an attack shortly after 10:00 GMT,” museum spokesman Klaus Pokorny told AFP.

“After an initial check in the presence of the restoration team, it is possible erase all worries about any possible damage to the work or its original frame,” the institution said in a statement.

The “Last Generation” group, which brings together German and Austrian activists, claimed responsibility for the action on Twitter, posting images.

In the photos, you can see two men attacking the workone of them trying to reach into the glass before being stopped by an employee.

“Stop destroying (humanity) with fossil fuels. We are running towards climate hellyelled one of the activists.

This Tuesday, admission to the museum was free for a day sponsored by the Austrian oil group OMV.

“The militants’ concerns are legitimate, but attacking the works of art is certainly not the best way to prevent the expected changes in the weather,” museum director Hans Peter Wipplinger reacted.

For his part, the Secretary of State for Culture, Andrea Meyer (ecologist), expressed solidarity with the “concerns and also the desperation” of the activists, in a statement sent to AFP.

But he felt that “accepting the risk of irreversible damage to works of art is not the way to go”.

The two activists were not arrested, but are the subject of “a complaint for material damage and disturbance of public order,” said an Austrian police spokesman.

The activist group describes itself as “the first generation to experience the onset of climate collapse and the last that can yet stop it”.

In recent weeks, environmental activists have taken action around the world, attacking works of art to warn the public about global warming.

Among the targets of the attacks are two works by Goya in the Prado Museum in Madrid, Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” in London and a painting by Claude Monet in Potsdam, near Berlin.

Although none of the paintings were damaged, the “Sunflowers” incident did damage the frame of the painting.

Following the attacks, major international museums such as the Prado, the Louvre in Paris or the Guggenheim Museum in New York last week declared themselves “deeply shocked” by the threat against “irreplaceable” works.

With information from AFP

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