Nicola Bolla is an Italian artist whose signature style appears to be bedazzling objects with Swarovski crystals. And when I say “bedazzle,” I mean completely covering the item in question. He did this to a toilet, I sh-t you not. So one of his sparkly sculptures was on display in Palazzo Maffei, a museum in fair Verona, where we lay our scene. The title of the piece was “Van Gogh,” and it was a bedazzled chair. What’s in a name? Apparently, it’s an homage to van Gogh’s painting of a chair. (Please, like we don’t know Vincent was a rhinestone queen.) The chair artwork was on a pedestal, but not otherwise protected from viewers, other than a placard that said “Do Not Touch.” And guess what? Someone touched. It was actually two visitors, and by “touched,” I mean they took turns SITTING on the chair. And as it turns out, by “chair,” I mean a structure Bolla built himself that’s mostly held together with foil. Although this happened in April, Palazzo Maffei has only just released the video, to which I say, grazie mille.
Footage released by the Palazzo Maffei, in Verona, shows a man and woman taking pictures of each other while pretending to sit on the so-called “Van Gogh” chair.
The man then appears to slip and fall onto the chair, crushing it underneath him.
Officials have since notified police about the pair, who have not been identified.
“Sometimes we lose our brains to take a picture, and we don’t think about the consequences,” says museum director Vanessa Carlon.
“Of course it was an accident, but these two people left without speaking to us — that isn’t an accident,” she adds. “This is a nightmare for any museum”.
The BBC understands this incident happened in April. Palazzo Maffei released the footage on 12 June.
The chair was built by Italian artist Nicola Bolla and is bejewelled with Swarovski crystals made from polished, machine-cut glass. It is named after Vincent van Gogh as a tribute to the Dutch artist’s painting of a simple chair.
Bolla’s piece is somewhat priceless, in that the museum declined to provide an estimate of its value when asked by the BBC.
Carlotta Menegazzo, an art historian based at the Palazzo Maffei, says that — while it looks sturdy — its frame is mostly hollow and kept together with foil.
“On the chair was a note warning people not to touch, and of course it is placed on a pedestal, so it’s quite clear it’s not a real chair,” says Ms Menegazzo.
Two legs and the main seat were broken, but Ms Menegazzo says “a great job” has been done to restore the piece and it is now back in place.
The Palazzo Maffei opened in 2020 and has 650 pieces on display, including paintings by Picasso and ancient Egyptian art.
Ms Carlon says the majority of visitors are considerate, and she hopes this release of CCTV footage won’t become a “negative episode”.
Instead, she wants to highlight that “anyone should enter art places, or museums or churches, wherever art is displayed, in a more respectful way”.
“Art must be respected and loved because it is very fragile,” she adds.
Che pazzo! All of it! Every aspect of this story is insane to me, yes starting with the fact that covering a chair in Swarovski crystals is considered museum-worthy. I know art is subjective, but come on. Ancient Egyptian works. Picassos. Bedazzled chair. Then there’s the title, “Van Gogh,” — it’s just an attention grab, right? But putting those points aside, my incredulity next turns to the artwork chair not being properly protected, including by humans. The museum really had no one on the floor guarding the exhibits? Shouldn’t someone have heard the chair collapsing? If a bejewelled chair falls in the gallery, and no one is around to hear it, does it still make a sound? But of course the craziest part of all this, is the couple taking turns sitting on the damn chair! I agree with the museum director that the only thing worse than breaking it was their scurrying off instead of fessing up. So even though I do not have the highest opinion of this particular artform (as with many pieces these days), please folks, let’s be decent and not touch what isn’t ours. Other than that, all I can say is that I hope Bolla’s Swarovski-clad toilet goes on a date sometime with Maurizio Cattelan’s golden toilet. Also, this line was wry perfection: “Bolla’s piece is somewhat priceless, in that the museum declined to provide an estimate of its value when asked by the BBC.”
photos and videos via Instagram and Twitter/Palazzo Maffei
The museum director has way too much grace toward these people- grown-a^^ adults shouldn’t have to be told not to sit on any museum exhibit. [And my usual “art is a money-laundering scam” remarks.]
I hope they identify these two. Then maybe they will stop doing selfish stunts like this.
Hmmm. Just looking at them – the clothes, the styling, etc. $20 buck says this idiot couple were likely American or British……..SMH.
Omg that was exactly what I was thinking, either a British or American tourist. Also, if you ever travel to Italy Verona is a must see, it is just a beautiful city. I travel there often.
Haha that was my first thought too!
I was thinking the same thing. Actually, I was thinking, Please don’t let them be Americans. They aren’t wearing shorts, so maybe not Americans???
Those two have to be Germans. That’s 💯 what people look like here in Germany. And on their holidays “I’m Süden”. Cross-body bag on the man and all.
Art doesn’t have to be serious to be worthy. Someone had an idea and a vision and put their time and effort into executing it and also putting in the work it takes to exhibit it. I value that artist’s work as well as the museum’s work in curating it.
Fuck these two selfish, entitled dicks. The idea that every room in every museum or gallery should have guards (?!) or everything behind fibreglass to protect against stupidity is terrifying. Fix the stupidity, don’t make the world an idiot’s playground.
I recall reading an interview w/ a US artist who covered items in Swarovski crystals & she had words about the painstaking process of working w/ Swarovski crystals. It is very precise & labor intensive, placing the unwieldy pieces flush & evenly so they properly reflect the light.
.
Watching several short reels of what happened, it appears both were attempting a squat position to mimic sitting on the chair for their IG vacay pics, but the man lost his balance.
Thank you for saying this. I didn’t love the tone of this piece. Art is a commentary, an experience, and by its very nature, it’s not going to resonate with everyone. That doesn’t mean it’s not valuable and shouldn’t be treated with respect, even if we “don’t get it”. We absolutely shouldn’t need guards in every room to remind us to act respectfully and better than a hyper 8 yr old.
Eh. The art world is one of the most pointlessly gate kept fields that there is. Only some people are lifted up and celebrated in museums while the same work made by someone less male and less connected is regarded and denigrated as being “crafty.” This guy is essentially just repeating Damian Hirst’s work (and probably a half dozen other artists I don’t know of cause I’m no expert) and Hirst is what I would call a fraud anyway (I’m sorry but a painter who has teams of painters doesn’t meet my criteria for an artist. It’s not Renaissance times anymore). I refuse to play along and pretend that this is Art with a capital A. It’s commercialism. And it’s crap. Kismet was right to poke at it.
Thinking the same. My country is just making such a great impression on the world.
This was a hilarious write-up 😂
It’s a crystal-covered “copy” of the bent-legged chair in van Gogh’s painting, Bedroom at Arles. So, not, it’s not random at all.
Exactly. (Van Gogh actually did two stand-alone paintings of chairs: Gauguin’s Chair and Van Gogh’s Chair. They were done when the two artists were roommates.) It’s not an attention-grab to title it that way, nor is the piece itself way out there. It’s a concept rooted in art history, and it does take skill to create ANY chair, let alone one with no internal structure.
Exactly. My background is in art history and I knew just looking at it that it was a van Gogh reference. It seems weird to be joking/laughing about this – just very much not the tone that should be taken. I can’t understand why there were no security or docents in the room with a fragile piece that wasn’t roped off or behind glass, or why the pedestal wasn’t alarmed. That seems like an obvious mistake to me: having worked in museums it becomes obvious, people are idiots and barriers don’t stop them.
So i read the article, was fully side- don’t be an idiot tourist (likely one of ours- american, sigh)
and then i looked at the “pedestal” – it was like 3 inches high.
Put the art a little higher, give it a littler more of a stage!
That being said, i spent my east cost childhood touring homes of “founding fathers” and those chairs, while art, just old, had signs that said don’t sit, and occasionally a velvet rope in front of them. And even as a child i understood what that meant and did not ever touch the old furniture.
Hm. When I looked at the video, and especially when I saw the surrounding objects, it seemed very obvious that it was an art object. They were posing for photos of themselves with the chair. They knew it was art.
If it were a lot higher, then the viewer is looking under the chair — likely not what the artist wanted.
My son worked as an art museum security guard for a year and said he was constantly telling people not to touch the art, please don’t lean your camera against the priceless vase to film a TikTok, etc. Art museums want to be accessible so people will visit, but there are instances when more needs to be done to protect the work.
I heard about this and sent up some prayers they weren’t American. They look American.
My first thought: must be some fat American.
I’m going with Europeans as most American men don’t wear cross body bags
Well, well, it sounds like I have *two* things in common with Nicola Bolla! In high school art class a foreign-exchange student and I worked for months on a papier-mache toilet (my magnum opus). As soon as it was finished a student from another class sat on it and crushed it, of course. I’ve always felt so silly about being devastated by the cavalier destruction of such a labor-intensive, but ultimately goofy, sculpture. So my heart goes out to the artist.
Thank god, they don’t appear to be Americans!
Museum and “artist” should display smashed chair and call it Dada.