Climate activists poured black dye into the historic Barcaccia fountain in Rome's Spanish Steps today and unfurled a banner demanding to stop investing in fossil fuels. The action turned the water in the fountain black before the eyes of the thousands of tourists and residents who walked through the square, one of the monumental symbols of the Italian capital, and many of them reacted with boos. The dye is a charcoal-based liquid, according to local media reports.
The activists, two men and one woman, belong to the group "Ultima Generazione" (Last Generation), which has claimed responsibility for the protest on its social networks, as it did in the past against similar contras in other cities. "It is absurd that you are scandalized by gestures like this when we are experiencing a drought emergency that puts agriculture, energy production... our own subsistence in crisis. And there are those responsible," they wrote on Twitter. The three activists have been detained by agents of the Carabineros.
The Barcaccia fountain, a boat-shaped symbol at the foot of the Spanish Steps, was built between 1626 and 1629 in travertine marble by Pietro Bernini, father of the famous Gian Lorenzo Bernini, who is believed to have collaborated in the works. The sculpture was ordered by Pope Urban VIII to distribute the water that came from the Vergine aqueduct throughout the city.
It is not the first time that these activists have attacked heritage with actions like these. Last November they threw soup at a Van Gogh painting from a temporary exhibition in Rome and stained with paint the "The Finger" by Maurizio Cattelan in front of the Milan Stock Exchange or the equestrian sculpture of Vittorio Emanuele II in front of the Duomo or cathedral of that city.
On March 17, two other young people stained the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, the seat of the town hall, with orange paint and were arrested by the mayor himself, Dario Nardella. On the other hand, two activists are also being tried in the Vatican Court for damaging the base of this Laocoön sculpture with glue in a protest and could be sentenced to prison from one month to three years and a fine of about 3,000 euros.
In Spain, a group of climate activists attacked the facade and one of the lions at the main entrance of the Congress of Deputies with red paint last Thursday. The eight demonstrators were quickly reduced and identified by members of the National Police. The protest coincided with the start of the trial of six of the fifteen members of Rebellion Científica who threw beetroot juice at Congress in April 2022, a judicial process that some described as "criminalizing the protest."
