Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece- The Mona Lisa, arguably one of the most famous paintings in the world, was smeared with cake on Sunday last week, at the Louvre Museum, in a stunt by a climate change protester.

The culprit, disguised as a woman wearing a black wig and lipstick, had visited the Louvre in a wheelchair, possibly in an attempt to gain access to the front row space reserved for people with disabilities.

 

Visitors at the incident scene said the man stood up swiftly from his wheelchair and smudged cream cake over the glass case protecting the renaissance painting. However, the portrait remains unscathed, thanks to the bulletproof glass.

 

One of the videos posted on social media showed the staff member wiping off the smear on the painting. Another video shows security men escorting the attacker and his wheelchair away from The Mona Lisa.

 

While they escorted him out of the museum, the protester took that moment to explain the reasons for his actions in French. "Think about the Earth." He said. "There are people who are destroying the Earth. Think about it ... all artists, think about the Earth. This is why I did this. Think about the planet."

 

 It makes one wonder if attacking the 15th-century portrait would save the planet Earth from destruction. The Guardian, however, reports that the attacker is under the police psychiatric unit care. There's also an investigation ongoing at the Paris prosecutor’s office on the charge of an attempt to vandalize the cultural work.

 

Although this is not the first time people have tried to attack the Mona Lisa painting yet, Leonardo's painting has managed to survive it all. In 1956, a Bolivian man threw a rock at the portrait.

 

A woman also spray-painted the portrait in 1974 at the Tokyo National Museum to protest against the museum’s lack of access for the disabled. In 2009, a Russian woman threw an empty teacup at the painting because she was denied French citizenship. Many attempts were made to also steal the Mona Lisa to no avail.