Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/08/03/tourist-snaps-toes-off-italian.html
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Hey, at least an american wasn’t blamed this time.
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this is why we can’t climb on the Great Pyramid anymore.
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I would like to take this opportunity to thank the vandal for not being an American this time.
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Nah. All of the pyramid’s toes were snapped off long ago.
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An important distinction; this is the plaster cast, not a marble sculpture.
The photo the Art Newspaper used showing the broken toe did not show a barrier.
The photo used in the BoingBoing post is the marble.
Plaster and marble are the same colour, someone might not know the difference.
Not condoning this, but supporting how this could happen.
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Yeah, we’re usually like Florida Man to the rest of the world.
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Yeah, I’ve always held that the US despite perhaps having a disproportionate number
by no means has a monopoly on the specimen often known as the Lout.
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The plaster cast has sprue marks all over it.
I know from experience that people* can be really clueless and that museums often rely on docents and silent alarms to provide a barrier around art, assuming that people aren’t clueless.
Edit to add: I’m assuming everything in this Gipsoteca museum is plaster. The marble is in the Villa Borghese.
*people means me; I’ve committed many faux pas over the years, constantly humiliating my partner, an actual art historian who is appalled by my near-sighted buffoonery.
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NO.
It doesn’t matter what it’s made of, you shouldn’t be touching a sculpture by Antonio Canova just so you can take a damned selfie.
And as for that Facebook comment, why is it up to the museum to put up more security? Why isn’t it the responsibility of the people to act with more thought for the items in the museum? Maybe you should have to sign a deposit before you go in. Perhaps that would make some people treat museums with a bit more respect.
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Yes and no. I’m not arguing with you.
That might be a very important distinction. Having never been to this museum, that point may have been impressed upon everyone who visits there. Which makes the act far more inexcusable.
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Don’t want visitors breaking priceless artifacts for selfies? Have actual consequences for violating the rules, enforce them, and show them being enforced. That applies to a whole lot of things, but is rarely implemented.
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So not a comment on Pauline Bonaparte’s activity in Haiti?
Um, 'cause people?
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Not that an American would be able to visit a museum in Northern Italy right now anyway, what with our passports being among the most useless in the world.
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Not to be confused with the time that a much more famous sculpture in Northern Italy got its toes damaged by a madman with the aid of a hammer.
https://www.nytimes.com/1991/09/15/world/michelangelo-s-david-is-damaged.html
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