I love the story of this “renovation” so much. The idea that someone thought they could do it, got in over their head, and just iteratively kept making it worse is so funny to me. “I think the eyes were here? And… and they were looking up a bit, right? And I’m pretty sure he was smiling… and had a mustache… that doesn’t make him look like an open-mouthed baboon does it? No, you’re right, what we’ve got is really close enough. I don’t think it’s that different, is it? I mean, I can tell because I’m a painter, but no one else is going to notice.” Bless their hearts.
When I heard about this case back in the day, all I could think about was that scene in the Mr Bean movie where he fucks up the painting of the old lady and tries to fix it.
Yeah, I was thinking, “It feels like a real life scene out of Mr. Bean,” but couldn’t justify why that was the show it reminded me of. I always forget about the movie.
“(The) priest knew it! He did! How could you do something like that without permission? He knew it!”
and the priest then washed his hands of her once she botched it.
That being said, the piece is getting so much attention that the little church is raking in donations, and the woman is now sueing for a piece of the pie:
I love the story of this “renovation” so much. The idea that someone thought they could do it, got in over their head, and just iteratively kept making it worse is so funny to me. “I think the eyes were here? And… and they were looking up a bit, right? And I’m pretty sure he was smiling… and had a mustache… that doesn’t make him look like an open-mouthed baboon does it? No, you’re right, what we’ve got is really close enough. I don’t think it’s that different, is it? I mean, I can tell because I’m a painter, but no one else is going to notice.” Bless their hearts.
The SNL bit on this with Kate McKinnon has me rolling every time.
When I heard about this case back in the day, all I could think about was that scene in the Mr Bean movie where he fucks up the painting of the old lady and tries to fix it.
Yeah, I was thinking, “It feels like a real life scene out of Mr. Bean,” but couldn’t justify why that was the show it reminded me of. I always forget about the movie.
So I was reading up about it a little, and apparently the lady did get some kind of spoken agreement from the priest that she could restore it:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19349921
and the priest then washed his hands of her once she botched it.
That being said, the piece is getting so much attention that the little church is raking in donations, and the woman is now sueing for a piece of the pie:
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2012/09/20/161466361/woman-who-ruined-fresco-of-jesus-now-wants-to-be-paid
That was over a decade ago. She now receives 49% of merchandizing profit.