Protesters throw soup at Mona Lisa painting in Paris

Two environmental protesters hurled soup on to the Mona Lisa at the Louvre in Paris, calling for “healthy and sustainable food”. The painting, which was behind bullet-proof glass, appeared to be undamaged.

Gallery visitors looked on in shock as two women threw the yellow-coloured soup before climbing under the barrier in front of the work and flanking the splattered painting, their right hands held up in a salute-like gesture.

One of the two activists removed her jacket to reveal a white T-shirt bearing the slogan of the environmental activist group Riposte Alimentaire (Food Response) in black letters.

Footage posted on X captured the attack on Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece as well as the gasps of visitors and the cries of children apparently shocked by the incident.

Louvre staff scrambled quickly to erect black cloth screens around the painting and the protesters but failed to effectively block the view of the scene.

The painting was attacked in May 2022 when someone threw a custard pie at it but it was unharmed. The most viewed painting in the world has long been protected behind a thick glass casing.

Riposte Alimentaire is part of the A22 umbrella movement of protest groups in 12 countries, which also includes Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion.

Questions were being asked as to how the women managed to smuggle the soup into the Louvre, as strict bag controls at most major galleries are now normal practice due to numerous other attacks on paintings, including a 2022 mashed potato attack by Letzte Generation (Last Generation) activists on Claude Monet’s Les Meules (Haystacks) at the Barberini gallery in Potsdam, Germany. Those activists subsequently glued their hands to a wall.

Prior to that, Just Stop Oil poured tomato soup over Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers at the National Gallery in London.