Austria: Activists throw black liquid at famous Klimt painting ‘Death and Life’

He was attacked with black liquid today, Tuesday (15/11) by activists for the climate the famous painting “Death and Life” by the Austrian painter Gustav Klimt located in the Leopold Museum, Vienna.

“Conservators are working to determine whether the panel which is protected by glass has been damaged,” museum spokesman Klaus Pokorny told AFP.

The “Letzte Generation” group, which includes German and Austrian activists, claimed responsibility for the action on Twitter by uploading images.

To them two men are seen vandalizing the work, with one taping his hand and another pouring a “black, oily liquid” on the glass in front of the work before being neutralized by a museum employee.

“Stop the destruction (of humanity) by fossil fuel energy. We are heading full speed towards climate hell”, they shouted, as reported by the Athens News Agency.

Entry was free today as part of St Leopold’s Day, sponsored by Austrian oil group OMV.

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

In recent weeks, militant environmentalists have ramped up their actions around the world targeting artworks to warn the public about global warming.

For example, stuck their hands on a Goya painting in Madrid or in Andy Warhol’s famous ‘Campbell’s Soup’ screen print on display in Australia, they threw tomato soup at Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ in London and mashed potatoes at a Claude Monet masterpiece in Potsdam, near Berlin.

Although the works remained intact, the “Sunflowers” incident caused slight damage to the frame of the painting.

Almost a hundred international museums, such as the Prado in Madrid, the Louvre in Paris or the Guggenheim Museum in New York, said last week they were “deeply shocked” by the reckless endangerment of these “irreplaceable” works.