It is a truth universally acknowledged that the Left can’t meme, but can only scold the Right for memeing well.
This dynamic was once confined to esoteric feuds among terminally online partisans. Now, it’s playing out in the open — between government agencies and what remains of the legacy media — and the stakes are increasingly tangible.
The Trump administration’s social media accounts have spent their summer appropriating classic images of Americana, notably J.M. Flagg’s famous<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Montgomery_Flagg#/media/File:I_Want_You_for_U.S._Army_by_James_Montgomery_Flagg.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> 1917 Uncle Sam poster</a>. But things really hit a fever pitch when the Department of Homeland Security shared three seemingly innocuous images: <a href="https://x.com/DHSgov/status/1948150126494482555" target="_blank" rel="noopener">John Gast’s 1872 “American Progress,”</a> with the caption “A Heritage to be proud of, a Homeland worth Defending.” <a href="https://x.com/DHSgov/status/1940164863793549747" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Thomas Kinkade’s “Morning Pledge”</a> with the caption “Protect the Homeland,” and<a href="https://x.com/DHSgov/status/1944875154745778525" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Morgan Weistling’s “A Prayer for a New Life”</a> captioned “Remember your Homeland’s Heritage.”
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Protect the Homeland.
“Morning Pledge” by Thomas Kinkade <a href="https://t.co/JLs26R3VlO">pic.twitter.com/JLs26R3VlO</a>
— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) <a href="https://twitter.com/DHSgov/status/1940164863793549747?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2025</a></blockquote>
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According to the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/2025/07/29/trump-dhs-immigrants-social-paintings/">Washington Post</a>, “the art world is not happy” with these posts because they are “part of an effort to rewrite the past with an exclusionary view of American history,” one in which there are clear standards of good and evil.
The Post doesn’t attempt to show why ordinary Americans should care about this. But while the Post’s freakout may be amusing to behold, it also gets at something important. Liberals are right to panic about these posts — and conservatives should pay attention.
The second Trump administration is staffed with right-wing Zoomers. These staffers are digital natives: born in the memeworld, molded by it, and in many cases more radically opposed to the leftwing hegemony that reached its apogee during their formative years than those of us who remember the days when cable news still dictated the terms of national conversation.
Those days are gone. Millennials like JD Vance and Stephen Miller hold high office. The aesthetic sensibilities of the Zoomers on their staff are shaping the administration’s narrative warfare, providing unprecedented air cover to the administration’s ground operations. Their social media habits are a visible sign of just how far the Left has fallen from its media and, thus, meaning-making monopoly.
The recent dustup about Homeland Security posting Americana paintings is just a minor skirmish in the larger war that is being waged for the sensibilities of the American people. Liberals have long realized that he who controls the production, distribution, and regulation of images controls the hearts, minds, and imaginations of the population.
Despite their confusion over other fundamental truths such as the difference between a man and a woman, liberals grasp this reality — and in it, something essential to the human condition.
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A Heritage to be proud of, a Homeland worth Defending.
American Progress &#8211; John Gast <a href="https://t.co/agU6bl8TZ8">pic.twitter.com/agU6bl8TZ8</a>
— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) <a href="https://twitter.com/DHSgov/status/1948150126494482555?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 23, 2025</a></blockquote>
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We are imaginative as well as rational creatures, embodied as well as capable of abstract thought. Our reasoning about right and wrong, true and false, never gets very far without referring to something particular we’ve experienced, either directly in our own lives or vicariously through the testimony of others — including stories and history. “Music,” in the classical and comprehensive sense of “the arts of the Muses,” matters.
In ancient Greece, the nine Muses were the daughters of “Memory” and presided over the arts. Mythology and biography, parable and narrative, have always been the primary means of moral and political education, and they remain so today. Americans in general still recognize the power of the “Muse-ical arts,” mainly in the potency of historical narratives such as the Civil War, World War II, and the Civil Rights Movement.
We would do well to recover the sense of power contained in other forms of “Music,” especially the storytelling power of films. Newer <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/watch/movies" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ventures</a> on the <a href="https://www.semafor.com/article/07/20/2025/founders-films-aims-to-remake-hollywood-with-patriotism-palantir-and-ayn-rand" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Right</a> are beginning to do this.
But we still have a long way to go. Even the artists whose work the Trump administration is now using aren’t safe from the Left’s appropriation.
The Kinkade Family Foundation, scandalized by the Trump administration’s use of his work, <a href="https://www.kinkadefamilyfoundation.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">declared</a> it was “deeply troubled to see this image used to promote division and xenophobia associated with the ideals of DHS” and pledged solidarity with “our communities who have been threatened and targeted by DHS, especially our immigrant, BIPOC, undocumented, LGBTQ+, and disabled relatives and neighbors.” Weistling, the only artist of the three still alive, took to his <a href="https://www.morganweistling.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">website</a> to distance himself from the politics of the moment: “The recent DHS post on social media using a painting of mine that I painted a few years ago was used without my permission.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Remember your Homeland’s Heritage.
New Life in a New Land &#8211; Morgan Weistling <a href="https://t.co/nFL61Nljbw">pic.twitter.com/nFL61Nljbw</a>
— Homeland Security (@DHSgov) <a href="https://twitter.com/DHSgov/status/1944875154745778525?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 14, 2025</a></blockquote>
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Still, there is a virtually inexhaustible store of classic works of mythology, literature, and history, ancient as well as American, waiting to be adapted by artists who love rather than revile our inheritance.
There is a lesson here for older conservatives. Liberal donors have long appreciated the political utility of culture. As a class, they have lavished funds on all manner of artistic ventures, sowing seeds broadly in the expectation that just a few of their investments will blossom into captivating cultural products. As a result, they have dominated the culture for generations — not because young people are naturally more liberal (Zoomer men are currently disproving this myth) — but because their cold, hard cash has helped drag the next generation leftward.
Conservative donors are more comfortable running a business than patronizing the arts. They tend to focus their charitable giving on well-defined causes with short-term returns on investment. They have thereby won discrete battles — winning this election, pushing that policy through Congress — while losing the broader war for the soul of the nation.
That the unembarrassed Americanism of artists like Kinkade and Weistling has enjoyed commercial success while swimming against the tide of liberal cultural hegemony is a sign of just how high a demand remains in the American public for non-leftist cultural products. Liberal hegemony is cracking up, and as the Trump administration gets serious about winding down its taxpayer-funded power bases, from NPR and PBS to elite universities, the crack-up is bound to continue.
The emergence of an energetic and effective American Right has far more to do with digital disruption than with a strategic change in the conservative donor class. Conservatives who are serious about reclaiming American culture, and consigning the most anti-American elements of the Left to the dustbin of history, should put a shoulder to the wheel — not just in lobbying and campaign donations, but in directly patronizing the artists, educators, and other culture creators who celebrate rather than denigrate our civilizational heritage.
Pavlos Papadopoulos is Associate Professor of Humanities at Wyoming Catholic College.
The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

American Progress

Americana Posting And The War For Culture

Conservatives

Department of Homeland Security

Gen Z

Painting

Washington Post

A woman could see a six-figure payday as a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/arts">painting</a> she picked up at a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/new-hampshire">New Hampshire</a> thrift store turned out to be the lost work of a master artist.
The woman, who chooses to remain anonymous, said she found the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/painting">piece</a> at Savers thrift store in Manchester, New Hampshire, in 2017, per <a href="https://nypost.com/2023/09/01/new-hampshire-woman-buys-painting-for-4-not-knowing-its-a-nc-wyeth-that-could-be-worth-250k/">The New York Post</a>. She had been hunting for old frames to fix up when she stumbled upon the item.
Thinking nothing of it, she paid the $4 purchase price without having any idea of the painting’s value. She hung it in her bedroom for several years and then out of curiosity, posted it on the Facebook group “Things Found In Walls – And Other Hidden Findings.” Maine-based conservator Lauren Lewis saw the post and realized it could be the real work of Newell Convers (N.C.) Wyeth.
Wyeth (1882 &#8211; 1945) was a prolific artist credited with more than 3,000 paintings. His best-known works were 25 pieces called Scribner&#8217;s, which were illustrations for the Scribner Classics publishing house. N.C. Wyeth was the son of artist Andrew Wyeth and grandson of Jamie Wyeth, also a notable artist of his time.
The piece going up for auction was part of a series of four works created for the 1939 edition of Helen Hunt Jackson’s 1884 novel “Ramona.” The book tells the tale of a Scottish-Native American girl living in Southern California after the Mexican-American war, the outlet noted. 
Now the formerly lost painting will be auctioned by Bonhams Skinner on September 19. The estimated bidding price is between $150,000 and $250,000.
“Wyeth deftly portrays the tension between Ramona and her rigid and overbearing foster mother, Señora Moreno,&#8221; the auction house wrote in the listing. Prior to this discovery, only one of the paintings from the series had been found.
The woman who found it recalled how she previously, “joked about it being a real painting.”
<a href="https://onelink.to/dwapp" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" aria-describedby="sk-tooltip-9096" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://onelink.to/dwapp&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1693504018745000&amp;usg=AOvVaw1RMMjCvCBOBYdpkw5O_njE">CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILYWIRE+ APP</a>
Lewis, the conservator who first recognized the piece for what it was, told <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/08/25/arts/rare-nc-wyeth-painting-new-hampshire-thrift-store/">The Boston Globe</a> she was “99 percent certain that it was authentic.”
“My assessment of the condition was that, while it certainly had some small scratches and it could use a surface clean, it was in remarkable condition considering none of us had any idea of its journey over the last 80 years,” she said.

frames

Woman Buys Painting For $4 At Thrift Store, Turns Out It Could Fetch Up To $250K

New Hampshire

U.S.

A <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/arts">modernist</a> painting by Piet Mondrian has been hanging upside down for more than seven decades, museum curators have discovered.
The <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/painting">painting</a> is called &#8220;New York City I&#8221; and combines geometric shapes with a primary color palette, which the Dutch artist is known for. Mondrian made several paintings as part of the “New York” series in the early 1940s after moving there from his native country. 
The <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/germany">German</a>-based gallery Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf has been exhibiting the work since 1980. All along even before it was acquired by its current home gallery, the colorful modernist painting was shown with the thicker cluster of overlapping lines toward the bottom of the work, but a photo of the artist’s studio shows “New York City I” hanging the opposite way, with the line cluster at the top.
&#8220;The density of the strips along the top edge lends the work a resemblance to its close relative &#8216;New York City,&#8217; in which the zone of greatest density is also located at the top edge,&#8221; the museum catalog says, per <a href="https://www.cnn.com/style/article/piet-mondrian-painting-upside-down-trnd/index.html">CNN</a>. &#8220;The blue strips along the left, top, and lower edges are now positioned in exactly the same places.&#8221;
“An initial visual inspection confirmed the suspicion that by turning the canvas upside down, the adhesive strips on the upper edge are aligned with the edge of the picture, whereas those at the lower edge peter out, with pieces missing here and there,&#8221; the explanation continues. 
&#8220;Assuming that Mondrian began by attaching the strips at the top, and, following the principle of gravity, unrolled them downward to attach them at the bottom of the canvas, then the painting has indeed been hanging upside down ever since it was first exhibited in 1945.&#8221;
Still, no one is sure which way the Dutch artist intended for the painting to hang, despite the photo they found. He died in 1944 at the age of 71. 
“Mondrian repeatedly turned the picture around while he was working on it, in which case there would be no right or wrong orientation,&#8221; the catalog notes.
&#8220;This may be the truly revolutionary feature of New York City 1: the fact that it can be read in any direction, like the street map of a big city, in an attitude of open-mindedness, moving every way at once, like couples dancing the boogie-woogie,&#8221; the description continues.
Museum curator Susanne Meyer-Büser said at a press conference last week that they aren’t planning to change the way the work is exhibited. “Turning it may risk damaging it — and the orientation confusion is now a unique part of the history of the object,” she said.

Modernist Mondrian Painting Has Been Hanging Upside Down For 75 Years, Museum Discovers

General

Germany

World

<div>
<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/johnny-depp">Johnny Depp</a> took in over $3.5 million in a matter of minutes after putting prints of his paintings of culture icons including <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/bob-dylan">Bob Dylan</a> and Keith Richards up for sale Thursday.
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The “Pirates of the Caribbean” actor, fresh off his legal victory over ex-girlfriend Amber Heard, sold 780 prints through Castle Fine Arts 37 British galleries. The portraits sold within hours of the sale’s announcement on Instagram.
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&#8220;I&#8217;ve always used art to express my feelings,&#8221; Depp said. &#8220;My paintings surround my life, but I kept them to myself and limited myself. No one should ever limit themselves.&#8221;
https://twitter.com/finelinevenus/status/1552596552841043969?s=20&#038;t=d5avmW6ofAHUJwm61TgvpA
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<div>
Depp’s “Friends And Heroes collection” features four people the actor says have inspired him and “who matter most to me, like my family, friends and people I admire.&#8221; In addition to Dylan and Richards, the collection includes portraits of Elizabeth Taylor and Al Pacino.
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Individual prints sold for just under $5,000, while the complete set went for $18,000.
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The gallery described the 59-year-old actor&#8217;s work as existing &#8220;at the intersection of pop art and street art&#8221; and as &#8220;pop art with feeling.&#8221; It had long been in talks with Depp about staging an exhibition and sale of his work, and intends to continue promoting Depp&#8217;s art in the future.
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In addition to acting and painting, Depp is an accomplished musician, playing guitar in his rock band the Hollywood Vampires and most recently jamming with guitar legend Jeff Beck while his dueling defamation trial with Heard took place in Fairfax, Virginia. A jury on June 1 found that Heard defamed Depp in an op-ed about domestic violence published by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/washington-post">The Washington Post</a> in 2018, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jury-awards-johnny-depp-15-million-but-hell-get-millions-less-heres-why">awarding</a> Depp $15 million in damages. The claim was then reduced to $10.35 million due to a limit on punitive damages under Virginia law.
Speculation has swirled about whether he will return to his signature role as Captain Jack Sparrow in the &#8220;Pirates&#8221; franchise. But a report that Disney had offered him over $300 million to reprise the character he says is loosely based on Richards were quickly shot down by Depp&#8217;s handlers.
“This is made up,” Depp’s spokesperson <a href="https://www.eonline.com/news/1335907/the-truth-about-johnny-depps-rumored-s300-million-pirates-of-the-caribbean-return">told</a> NBC News in a statement.
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Johnny Depp & Amber Heard Defamation Trial Continues

Johnny Depp Pulls In Millions With Sale Of His Portraits Of Icons Including Dylan, Richards

Johnny Depp Pulls In Millions With Sale of His Portraits of Icons Including Dylan, Richards

Amber Heard

Bob Dylan

Johnny Depp

A never-before-seen self-portrait of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/priceless-van-gogh-stolen-in-overnight-art-heist-targeting-museum-shuttered-by-coronavirus">Vincent Van Gogh</a> has been discovered behind another of the famous artist&#8217;s paintings, a Scottish museum announced.
The self-portrait of the tortured master <a href="https://www.nationalgalleries.org/art-and-artists/features/hidden-van-gogh-self-portrait-discovered">was found</a> on the back of his “Head of a Peasant Woman” when experts at the National Galleries of Scotland’s Edinburgh gallery took an x-ray of the canvas. The work had been hidden for over a century behind layers of glue and cardboard when it was framed.
“Moments like this are incredibly rare,&#8221; said Frances Fowle, a senior curator at the National Galleries of Scotland. “We have discovered an unknown work by Vincent Van Gogh, one of the most important and popular artists in the world.&#8221;
<div id="attachment_409527" style="width: 457px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-409527" class="wp-image-409527 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.41.01-PM-447x576.png" alt="A hidden masterpiece by Van Gogh has been discovered after more than a century" width="447" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.41.01-PM-447x576.png 447w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.41.01-PM-233x300.png 233w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.41.01-PM.png 608w" sizes=" (max-width: 447px) 100vw, 447px" />X-ray image of Vincent Van Gogh’s self-portrait. (GRAEME YULE/NATIONAL GALLERIES OF SCOTLAND)</div>
Van Gogh, who died penniless and famously lopped off his own ear during a fight with a friend, often painted on both sides of the canvas. The newly discovered self-portrait shows him bearded, wearing a loose neckerchief and sporting a wide-brimmed hat. Experts agreed there is no doubt it was a self-portrait, and likely from an early period of his career.
Van Gogh painted &#8220;The Head of a Peasant Woman&#8221; in 1885, three years before he sliced off his left ear.
Art experts are trying to figure out how to delicately remove the glue and cardboard without harming “Head of a Peasant Woman.”
<div id="attachment_409538" style="width: 462px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-409538" class="wp-image-409538 size-large" src="https://www.dailywire.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.47.12-PM-452x576.png" alt="A museum in Scotland has discovered a never-seen self-portrait of master painter Vincent van Gogh" width="452" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.47.12-PM-452x576.png 452w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.47.12-PM-235x300.png 235w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2022/07/Screen-Shot-2022-07-15-at-12.47.12-PM.png 758w" sizes=" (max-width: 452px) 100vw, 452px" />Vincent van Gogh: The Head of a Peasant Woman, 1885. ANTONIA REEVE/NATIONAL GALLERIES OF SCOTLAND</div>
&#8220;When we saw the x-ray for the first time of course we were hugely excited,&#8221; senior paintings conservator Lesley Stevenson said in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6KR2HTPIXI&amp;feature=emb_imp_woyt">a video</a> shared by National Galleries of Scotland. &#8220;Such a major discovery happens once, twice in a conservator&#8217;s lifetime&#8230; To have an image, as elusive as it presently is, is something very, very special.&#8221;
Visitors to an exhibit set for July 30-November 13 at the Royal Scottish Academy in Edinburgh will be able to view an X-ray image of the self-portrait through a lightbox.

The EY Exhibition: Van Gogh And Britain Opens At The Tate Britain

See It: How A Museum Discovered A Long-Hidden Van Gogh Self-Portrait

'Incredibly Rare': How A Museum Discovered A Long-Hidden Van Gogh Self-Portrait

Scotland

<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/environmentalists">Far-left kooks</a> continued their war on masterpieces Tuesday, with a group of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/climate-change">climate-change</a> activists gluing their hands to a copy of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/it-fake-da-vinci-painting-fetched-450-million-joseph-curl">Leonardo da Vinci</a>’s “The Last Supper” at a museum in London.
The shocking incident, at the Royal Academy of art gallery, is at least the fourth time in recent weeks protesters have taken their grievances out on priceless art. In May, a cross-dressing climate-change activist <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/man-dressed-as-woman-throws-cake-at-the-mona-lisa">threw cake at the Mona Lisa</a> and last month two activists <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10972403/The-REPEAT-offenders-superglued-Van-Gogh-painting.html">glued their hands to a Van Gogh</a> in a London museum.
“Ladies and gentleman, we are sorry for the disruption,&#8221; one of the five demonstrators glued to the da Vinci said. “Leonardo da Vinci said out of all the sciences art is the queen of communication. And now more than ever in this day and age, communication with truth and of the experience of humanity during these times of catastrophic climate is needed now more than ever.”
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Look into who funds these idiots your prob find it’s Soros <a href="https://t.co/zUVHuzqWDH">https://t.co/zUVHuzqWDH</a> Climate protesters glue themselves to 16th-century Leonardo da Vinci painting at Royal Academy <a href="https://t.co/CXHpCFUtRS">pic.twitter.com/CXHpCFUtRS</a>
&mdash; NinnyD 🇬🇧❤️🇺🇸 Waiting~4~the Revolution (@ninnyd101) <a href="https://twitter.com/ninnyd101/status/1544313343728549893?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 5, 2022</a></blockquote>
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The group, which calls itself “Just Stop Oil,” painted the words “No New Oil” below the painting. The group demanded that the United Kingdom stop issuing licenses for oil and gas exploration.
“The truth is that any new oil expansion is a death sentence for the future,” the head protester declared. “It’s a death sentence for the younger generations and it’s a death sentence for the nature that has directly inspired art for tens of thousands of years.”
The da Vinci copy was painted by two of his apprentices, Giampietrino and Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio in about 1515. It depicts Jesus and his 12 apostles gathered at a dinner table.
The protesters remained glued to the painting for several hours before law enforcement officials removed them.
On Monday, two &#8220;Just Stop Oil&#8221; activists were arrested after gluing themselves to the frame of John Constable&#8217;s &#8220;The Hay Wain&#8221; in London&#8217;s National Gallery.
Last week, two activists glued themselves to Vincent van Gogh&#8217;s 1889 masterpiece “Peach Trees in Blossom,” which he painted shortly after lopping off his own ear.
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Two climate protestors from the group <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/JustStopOil?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#JustStopOil</a> glued themselves to the frame of a Vincent Van Gogh painting at the Courtauld Gallery in London.
The activists called for the government to end the ’40 new fossil fuel projects’ being pushed through. <a href="https://t.co/13429CUFcZ">pic.twitter.com/13429CUFcZ</a>
&mdash; Euronews Culture (@euronewsculture) <a href="https://twitter.com/euronewsculture/status/1542807878137937920?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 1, 2022</a></blockquote>
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“Sorry everybody, we don’t want to be doing this,” protester Louis McKenchie told gallery attendees, “we’re here glued to this painting, this beautiful painting, because we’re terrified for our future. We’re here from a group called ‘Just Stop Oil.’ We expect to be arrested today.”
In the May protest at the Louvre, a man dressed as a woman in a wheelchair jumped up and smeared cake on the world&#8217;s most famous painting, da Vinci&#8217;s &#8220;Mona Lisa.&#8221; But the painting, which is protected by bulletproof glass, was not damaged.
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Aquí el momento en que se llevan a quien le aventó un pastel a la Monalisa.<a href="https://t.co/HBayMOdcKV">pic.twitter.com/HBayMOdcKV</a>
&mdash; Alejandro Alemán (@elsalonrojo) <a href="https://twitter.com/elsalonrojo/status/1530964995873316864?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 29, 2022</a></blockquote>
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The Last Supper

Leftist Vandals Escalate War On Art, Gluing Themselves To Another Masterpiece

Protesters Glue Themselves To Da Vinci Copy In Latest Protest Over Climate

Climate Change

London

Oil and Gas

A man dressed as an old woman reportedly smeared cake on the glass protecting Leonardo da Vinci&#8217;s masterpiece, the Mona Lisa, at the Louvre on Sunday.
According to reports, a man donned a wig and posed as an elderly woman in a wheelchair before entering the <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/terror-louvre-machete-wielding-man-shouts-allahu-james-barrett/">Louvre</a> art museum in Paris, France. Once he neared the priceless work of art, he reportedly threw cake at the painting and attempted to smash the bulletproof glass that protects it from just such an attack.
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The protective glass of the Mona Lisa painting at The Louvre was caked today by a man dressed up as an elderly woman in a wheelchair. <a href="https://t.co/g8uaQZ1wPp">pic.twitter.com/g8uaQZ1wPp</a>
&mdash; Pop Base (@PopBase) <a href="https://twitter.com/PopBase/status/1530990759716892672?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 29, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Video of the incident was posted on Twitter, long with the comment, &#8220;Maybe this is just nuts to me but an [sic] man dressed as an old lady jumps out of a wheel chair and attempted to smash the bullet proof glass of the Mona Lisa. Then proceeds to smear cake on the glass, and throws roses everywhere before being tackled by security.&#8221;
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Maybe this is just nuts to me💀but an man dressed as an old lady jumps out of a wheel chair and attempted to smash the bullet proof glass of the Mona Lisa. Then proceeds to smear cake on the glass, and throws roses everywhere all before being tackled by security. 😂??? <a href="https://t.co/OFXdx9eWcM">pic.twitter.com/OFXdx9eWcM</a>
&mdash; Lukeee🧃 (@lukeXC2002) <a href="https://twitter.com/lukeXC2002/status/1530939993803440129?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 29, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Another video added the comment, &#8220;Here is the moment when they take away the person who threw a cake at Mona Lisa.&#8221;
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Aquí el momento en que se llevan a quien le aventó un pastel a la Monalisa.<a href="https://t.co/HBayMOdcKV">pic.twitter.com/HBayMOdcKV</a>
&mdash; Alejandro Alemán (@elsalonrojo) <a href="https://twitter.com/elsalonrojo/status/1530964995873316864?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 29, 2022</a></blockquote>
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The alleged perpetrator reportedly smeared cake on the glass in an effort to raise awareness about the destruction of planet earth, witnesses claimed.
&#8220;A guy has thrown a cake at the Mona Lisa to raise awareness about the destruction of the planet,&#8221; one person <a href="https://twitter.com/JosPastr/status/1530972268850995202">explained</a> in a tweet.
The painting <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2013/11/18/world/europe/mona-lisa-the-theft/index.html">was stolen</a> in 1911 by an Italian handyman named Vincenzo Peruggia. He was not caught until two years later — and some experts believe that the theft was what truly put the famously enigmatic smile on the map.
&#8220;If a different one of Leonardo’s works had been stolen, then that would have been the most famous work in the world – not the Mona Lisa,&#8221; said <a href="http://noahcharney.smugmug.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Noah Charney</a>, art history professor and author.
<p class="paragraph inline-placeholder" data-uri="archive.cms.cnn.com/_components/paragraph/instances/paragraph_909D00D0-9A11-8F42-C1C5-5725C6E2BD3F@published" data-editable="text" data-component-name="paragraph" data-analytics-observe="off">&#8220;There was nothing that really distinguished it per se, other than it was a very good work by a very famous artist – that’s until it was stolen. The theft is what really skyrocketed its appeal and made it a household name,&#8221; he said.
The painting has been the target of attempted vandalism in the past as well, according to a <a href="https://www.marca.com/en/lifestyle/world-news/2022/05/29/6293b4df22601dc3408b45b6.html">report</a> from Marca.com.
&#8220;A man threw sulfuric acid at it in the 1950s, which had an effect on the painting, and a Bolivian student hit it with a stone. A woman in a wheelchair sprayed red paint on her wheelchair while she was at an exhibition in Tokyo in 1974, expressing her dissatisfaction with the lack of access ramps,&#8221; the outlet reported.
Additionally, in 2009, a Russian tourist threw tea at the painting.

FRANCE-HEALTH-VIRUS-PANDEMIC-MUSEUM-`LOUVRE

Man Dressed As Woman Throws Cake At The Mona Lisa

Museum

Theft

Andy Warhol&#8217;s famous silkscreen of Marilyn Monroe shattered the all-time record for the highest price achieved for a piece of American artwork during an auction on Monday night in New York City.
&#8220;Warhol’s 1964 silk-screen of just her face, &#8216;Shot Sage Blue Marilyn&#8217; sold for about $195 million,&#8221; The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/09/arts/design/warhol-auction-marilyn-monroe.html?smid=tw-nytimes&amp;smtyp=cur">reported</a>. &#8220;The 40-inch-by-40-inch painting, a trophy given its vibrant colors and glamorous subject matter, eclipsed the previous high price of $110.5 million for a Basquiat skull painting at Sotheby’s in 2017 as well as Warhol’s auction high for a car crash painting that sold for $105.4 million in 2013.&#8221;
The auction launched the city&#8217;s line up of major auctions this season and showcased the resilient nature of the high-end art market.
&#8220;At least four bidders vied for the work, with dealer Larry Gagosian winning it after a roughly four-minute-long bidding battle in Christie’s Rockefeller Center salesroom in Manhattan,&#8221; The Wall Street Journal <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/warhols-iconic-marilyn-monroe-portrait-sells-for-195-million-at-christies-11652143969">reported</a>. &#8220;Heading into the latest sale, Christie’s had high expectations for the work, giving it a $200 million estimate.&#8221;
Silkscreen printing has been around for thousands of years and is &#8220;a stenciling method that involves printing ink through stencils that are supported by a porous fabric mesh stretched across a frame called a screen,&#8221; HarmstonArts <a href="https://www.harmstonarts.com/the-process.html">notes</a>. &#8220;Silkscreen Printing is ideally suited for bold and graphic designs.&#8221;
The most expensive piece of artwork ever <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/leonardo-da-vinci-painting-salvator-mundi-sells-for-450-3-million-1510794281">sold</a> was Leonardo da Vinci’s rediscovered portrait of Jesus Christ, which was <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/saudi-arabias-crown-prince-identified-as-buyer-of-record-breaking-da-vinci-1512674099">purchased</a> in 2017 by Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for $450.3 million.
This report has been updated to include additional information.

US-ARTS-CHRISTIE’S

Andy Warhol’s ‘Marilyn’ Shatters Record For Highest Price Achieved At Auction For American Artist

Andy Warhol's 'Marilyn' sells for $195 million, sets record for American artist

Marilyn Monroe

On Monday, the French government made the announcement that it will be returning a Gustav Klimt painting to its true Jewish owners after the artwork was stolen by Nazis over 80 years ago.
The painting, &#8220;Rosebushes under the Trees,&#8221; is an oil work created in 1905. It was taken from a Jewish family in Austria in 1938 and has reportedly been on display in the Parisian museum, Musee d&#8217;Orsay, for decades.
French Culture Minister Roselyne Bachelot-Narquin said at a news conference in Paris that “the decision to return a major work from the public collections illustrates our commitment to the duty of justice and reparation vis-à-vis plundered families.”
Bachelot-Narquin clarified that the French officials did not originally know that the painting had been taken without permission, but the facts were revealed recently after the French government began investigating the topic.
“It is in recent years that the true origin of the painting has been established,” she said, noting that it was “the only Gustav Klimt painting owned by France.”
The mesmerizing painting will be given back to Nora Stiasny&#8217;s family. Stiasny was a victim of the Holocaust who was &#8220;dispossessed during a forced sale in August 1938,&#8221; according to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/paris-painting-france-austria-roselyne-bachelot-narquin-064912e19765fd9bb583bd9fef3a5c5c">The Associated Press</a>.
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/15/arts/design/france-klimt-painting-restitution.html">The New York Times</a> reports that Stiasny was born in Vienna in 1898. Her uncle, Viktor Zuckerkandl, was a collector of art and an affluent steel industrialist. He bought the oil artwork in 1911. Stiasny died in 1942 after being deported to Poland. Her husband and son also passed away.
Determining the origins of the painting was a difficult task. Bachelot-Narquin said, “All the necessary verifications had been carried out,&#8221; and the course was &#8220;particularly arduous because of the destruction of most proof and the erosion of family memories.&#8221;
Technically, the painting belongs to the country of France since it was bought in 1980 and is legally seen as the nation&#8217;s &#8220;inalienable&#8221; property. Bachelot-Narquin explained how France came to be in possession of the painting, stating that the Nazi sympathizer who originally bought the artwork in 1938 died in 1960. After his death, France bought it at an art gallery. Authorities stated on Monday that the country looked into the original sourcing of the painting when it was purchased, but there were no signs that it had been sold in the manner discovered later.
In order for the painting to be returned to Stiasny&#8217;s family, Parliament will need to vote to pass legislation to allow the transfer. Bachelot-Narquin said this would take place as soon as possible.
An Austrian lawyer who represents the family of Stiasny said that her heirs are &#8220;very satisfied and very grateful.&#8221;
According to <a href="https://news.artnet.com/exhibitions/gust-klimt-100-million-club-284649">Artnet News,</a> previous Klimt paintings have sold for over $100 million. Oprah Winfrey is also <a href="https://news.artnet.com/market/oprah-sells-famed-gustav-klimt-portrait-150-million-851537">reported</a> to have sold a Klimt painting in 2016 for $150 million.
The painting is not alone in its difficult history. Thousands of other pieces of art ended up on display in French museums after the Allies triumphed over Nazi Germany in 1945. While many have been returned to their rightful owners, in recent years, French officials have reportedly increased their attempt to solve the mysteries of where certain works of art truly belong.

AF1FB2C4-C8E9-46A1-9F33-B972734C5244_1_201_a

France To Return Klimt Painting Stolen By Nazis To Jewish Heirs

Holocaust

A North Carolina artist who created a viral painting in 2009 of Santa Claus kneeling over the baby Jesus is claiming that for the second time in two years, the painting was temporarily censored by Facebook.
Gaye Frances Willard said of the latest alleged censorship of the painting that Facebook flagged it for &#8220;violent content.&#8221;
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As we approach <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Christmas?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Christmas</a>, the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/STEM?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#STEM</a> Network would like to wish everyone a very Blessed Christmas. May you have the gift of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/faith?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#faith</a>, the blessing of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/hope?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#hope</a> &amp; the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/peace?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#peace</a> of His <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/love?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#love</a> at Christmas and always. (Artist: Gaye Frances Willard) <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/catholiced?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#catholiced</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/catholicschoolla?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#catholicschoolla</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/education?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#education</a> <a href="https://t.co/9jigrSJad6">pic.twitter.com/9jigrSJad6</a>
&mdash; ADLA STEM Network Schools (@STEMschoolsLA) <a href="https://twitter.com/STEMschoolsLA/status/1076251083075448835?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 21, 2018</a></blockquote>
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Willard told <a href="https://myfox8.com/news/painting-depicting-santa-and-baby-jesus-blocked-deemed-violent-by-facebook/">FOX8</a> earlier this month that she had always wanted to be an artist, recalling, “I was about 3 and my mother said I used to draw on the wall. I would draw one little line and a circle.” She focused primarily on portraits during her career, saying she centered on the subject’s eyes, adding, “I want it to have an emotional effect.”
She said of her 2009 painting, “When I did that one, I wasn’t really thinking about what anybody else would think because I did it for me. … I intended to paint a cross in this particular painting, but I did it in the shape of a star, because I think the cross and the message of the cross is central to the Christmas story. … When I walked back into the room, where it sat on the easel, I immediately saw another cross that I did not intend to be there, and it is perfectly positioned at the feet of Jesus.”
“Someone posted it, and you know how these things go, it just went viral and went everywhere,” she recalled. “This painting has been all over the world. I hear from people all over the world.”
But in 2018, Willard’s son emailed her that someone had noted that the painting was allegedly censored by Facebook. She said, “Right after I heard from him, I started hearing from other people who had shared it and said they weren’t able to share it, it’d been blocked.” She said that Facebook released the post the next day, prompting her to speculate that many people must have complained.
<a href="https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/facebook-santa-jesus-image/">Snopes</a> fact-checked the claim and confirmed that Facebook &#8220;briefly overlaid a religious image with a warning screen about &#8216;violent or graphic content,'&#8221; but noted that &#8220;the same image has been freely viewable on Facebook for years, it was not deleted or blocked such that users could no longer see it, and the warning screen was soon removed.&#8221;
Willard told FOX8 that someone had told her the painting was censored again recently for allegedly violent content. She said, “It happened again almost, well it was two years and one day, it happened again. And they blocked it for violent content. That’s what it said. … Either Santa Claus is violent, or baby Jesus is violent, or the two of them together.”
“Willard adds that she’s spoken to someone who was able to contact Facebook, where a representative told her the picture was blocked because of the social media company’s algorithms,” FOX8 reported.
It is unclear if the image was actually &#8220;blocked&#8221; or again overlaid with the &#8220;violent content&#8221; warning, as it reportedly had been in 2018.
Willard stated, “I don’t know how many peoples’ posts that it sees fit to block; it’s more than one because it’s a lot of people who say “I tried to share this and look what happened. … This painting has been all over the world … I hear from people all over the world.”
Asked “how much stuff” she had seen on Facebook that she would think would be classified as violent, Willard laughed, “Now that’s a loaded question right there.” Asked what one word she would use to categorize her painting rather than “violence,” Willard said simply, “I would categorize it as worship.”
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Blue Nativity

Artist Claims Facebook Temporarily Censored Viral Painting Of Santa And Jesus Second Time

Facebook

Jesus Christ

Santa Claus

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