The protest by the campaign group Just Stop Oil at the National Gallery in London last month made headlines worldwide. The hurling of tomato soup all over Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers certainly made the world sit up and listen to the eco-activists who are “demanding that the UK government halts all new oil and gas projects”.
PROBLEM SOLVED!! 👍 pic.twitter.com/6uBGf2Ynbn
— beeple (@beeple) October 16, 2022
Art-world figures were quick to wade in with their own take on the soupy demo, including Beeple (real name: Mike Winkelmann), who last year sold a record-breaking NFT at Christie’s for $69.3m (Everydays: The First 5000 Days, 2021). Mr Beeple posted a mischievous image on Twitter of two clownish figures taking a selfie in front of the splatted Van Gogh with the caption “Problem Solved!!”. We asked him why he made the cryptic pic but there was no response from the usually vocal provocateur: does he not approve of their clownish behaviour?
