By Tim Binnall
A jaw-dropping piece of security footage from an Italian art museum shows the mortifying moment when a clumsy tourist slipped while taking a picture and wound up crushing a crystal-covered chair. The unfortunate incident, which reportedly occurred in April, came to light last week when the Palazzo Maffei in Verona shared the video (seen above) on social media. Lamenting that "every museum's nightmare has become reality," they explained that the couple in the footage were snapping some 'amusing' pictures wherein they posed as if they were about to sit on artist Nicola Bolla's piece 'Van Gogh's Chair' when one of the pair lost his footing and landed atop the priceless piece covered in hundreds of Swarovski crystals.
No doubt concerned about the damage they had just caused, the couple quickly fled the scene after crushing the fragile chair that is said to be a "mostly hollow" frame "kept together with foil." While museum director Vanessa Carlon acknowledged that the incident was a terrible mistake, she criticized the couple for not taking responsibility for their actions. "These two people left without speaking to us," she observed, "that isn't an accident." To that end, the museum reported the matter to the police, though it is uncertain if the pair will ever face justice as they have yet to be identified and, if they were tourists, may not even be in Italy anymore.
Fortunately, the damaged seat and legs of the eye-catching chair have since been repaired and the piece is back on display. The museum indicated they opted to share the footage with the public "to raise awareness of the value of art and the respect it deserves." For his part, Bolla reportedly offered something of a philosophical take on the accidental destruction of his work. Calling the photo shoot gone wrong "an idiotic thing to do," he mused that the inadvertent incident was "like a kind of performance. Ordinary people can do it too, not just artists." One imagines that, should the couple ever get caught, the artist's appreciation for the unusual event will not be shared by authorities or the museum.