Two environmental activists have been found guilty of vandalism for gluing themselves to a statue in the Vatican Museums. In the conclusion of the much-talked-about trial on Monday (June 12), Vatican judges sentenced the activists to nine months in prison and charged them a 1,500 euro fine with a suspended sentence of five years.
Guido Viero, 61, and Ester Goffi, 26, glued themselves to the statue of "Laocoön and His Sons", in the Vatican Museums last summer. A third activist, Laura Zorzini, filmed the other two in action with her phone. Zorzini was sentenced to pay a 120 euro fine.
The activists belong to the environmentalist group Ultima Generazione, “Last Generation,” which has become famous in Italy in recent years for drawing attention to the climate crisis through acts of vandalism targeting the country’s famed historical sites.
“He is more radical than we are,” said Tommaso Juhasz, a member of the Last Generation. “If one reads ‘Laudato Si’ and what it says and what it demands, it’s much more radical than we are,” he added, referencing Pope Francis’ 2015 encyclical promoting the care for the environment and the need for nations to come together to fight climate change.
Anna Melnykova, "Palace of Labor (palats praci), architector I. Pretro, 1916", shot with analog Canon camera, 35 mm Fuji film in March 2022.
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