Climate Activists Throw Soup at the Mona Lisa at the Louvre

Climate activists on Sunday flung soup at the Mona Lisa painting at the Louvre in Paris, protesting an allegedly poor farming and food system.

Two female demonstrators wearing shirts displaying the phrase, “FOOD RIPOSTE,” bypassed a security barrier to get to the Leonardo da Vinci masterpiece, video shows. They threw yellow-colored soup at the art, which is protected by a bulletproof glass case.

The women represent the environmental activist group Riposte Alimentaire (Food Response), which is involved in the A22 network, a collection of “disruptive climate campaigns in 11 countries,” the Guardian reported. The umbrella organization is funded by the U.S.-based Climate Emergency Fund.

Other members of A22 include Extinction Rebellion and the notorious “Just Stop Oil,” whose vandals were arrested in November after smashing the glass of Diego Velázquez’s painting, “The Toilet of Venus” at the National Gallery in London. Just Stop Oil began making international headlines in October 2022 as the group performed several viral stunts, including dousing Vincent van Gogh’s famous “Sunflowers” painting at the National Gallery in London with tomato soup.

“What’s the most important thing?” the women yelled to stunned onlookers and tourists Sunday. “Art, or right to a healthy and sustainable food? Our farming system is sick. Our farmers are dying at work.”

The pair of protesters held their hands in the air as they chanted. Museum staff rushed to try to obscure the scene from visitors with black cloth screens before moving to deescalate the situation.  Paris police said two individuals were arrested following the incident, according to the Guardian. Riposte Alimentaire told Agence France-Presse that the soup demonstration marked the “start of a campaign of civil resistance with the clear demand … of the social security of sustainable food.”

The soup tantrum comes as farmer protests have swept parts of France, including Paris, and smaller villages. Participants have used bales of hay and tractors to block main highways, splattered buildings with manure, and dumped imported produce onto roads, the Guardian said. France’s organic food market is struggling, with prices dropping while the cost of production continues to increase, leaving the country’s farmers with less take-home pay. Farmers are demanding better pay, less taxes, and more regulations on imports.

In recent years, multiple famous paintings have been defaced in the name of climate activism. At the Mauritshuis Museum in the Hague, Netherlands in November 2022, two Belgian vandals with Just Stop Oil Belgium targeted the Johannes Vermeer painting “Girl with a Pearl Earring.” One man glued his head to the painting as his partner poured a can of tomato soup over his head. The second man then glued his own hand to a wall mounting. A third videotaped the display.