Museums are trying to protect themselves from environmental activists

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Museum administrations have already written a joint letter. In it they mentioned the "fragility of the works"

On November 9, the administrations of the world's museums - among them the Prado in Madrid, the Louvre in Paris, the Museum of Art History in Vienna and the Guggenheim Museum in New York - wrote an open letter in which they outlined their attitude to the actions that are increasingly taking place in exhibition halls.

The leaders wrote that the activists underestimate the fragility of the works and do not realize the danger they endanger the paintings.

In some places, security measures have been tightened. In some museums, it is no longer possible to walk with bags and outerwear

As a rule, the entrance to the exhibitions is open to everyone, and the heads of world museums agree with this. But, according to media reports, they are already looking for ways to keep environmental activists out.

For example, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum and the Reina Sofia Art Center in Madrid are hiring police officers undercover and stepping up security both inside and outside the museums. The director of the Reina Sofia Center for the Arts, in particular, confirmed to journalists that the museum's management was especially careful about strengthening the security in the room with Picasso's Guernica. And the halls of the Barberini Museum in Potsdam, where in October activists doused a painting by Claude Monet with mashed potatoes, now you can’t go at all with a bag and outerwear (previously, small bags were still allowed to be taken with you).

In Germany, as in many other European countries, visitors are rarely thoroughly screened at the entrance to the museum, and they are also allowed to bring food into the museum grounds in order to later have a picnic in its garden. According to the head of the infrastructure and security department of the Hasso Plattner Foundation, which sponsors the Barberini Museum, it is rarely forbidden to bring bags into museums. Apparently, this is what allowed eco-activists to hold actions. For example, mashed potatoes, which were poured over a Monet painting, were carried by eco-activists in containers hidden under their clothes.

Not all museums can afford enhanced security. Instead, they have to teach their overseers new rules.

Many museums, however, have not yet recovered from the pandemic and simply cannot afford to double the security. You have to come up with something else.

Some museums are turning to private security consultants: Retired Israeli military man Amotz Brandes said his security firm, Chameleon Associates, has recently provided such services. Among their tips for museum curators is to pay attention to lonely visitors who communicate with each other with gestures.

The director of the Association of German Museums also believes that museums should prepare their old employees for new circumstances.

It would seem that the problem is solved. But such preparation takes not so little time as one might think. For example, after the attack on a Monet painting on October 23, the Barberini Museum took time out and closed until the end of the month to adapt the museum's security measures to new potential threats.

Now the paintings are mainly protected with the help of motion sensors that read the position of visitors relative to the painting, video surveillance and glazing of the paintings. However, museum leaders do not think that this helps in the situation with eco-activists. So far, they see no other way out than to ban visitors from carrying liquids and other items that are potentially suitable for protest actions in the halls.

Art critics are not very happy with such decisions. Restorers, on the other hand,

New restrictions from museums scare some art historians. In their opinion, this is too harsh a response to actions that do not harm the paintings.

Activists do deliberately attack glazed paintings so as not to damage them, but there is a risk of damage in this case. Restorers note that many old frames, as a rule, are not sealed, which means that liquid can reach the canvas itself through the gaps in the frame.

Despite this, turning museums into a "zone of increased control" is dangerous, says Hermann Parzinger, president of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation. He says he does not want paintings "lost" behind bulletproof glass. In his opinion, this approach interferes with the free dialogue of visitors with art.