The work passed into the hands of the French State after the death of the thinker Jacques Lacan in 1981, in payment of taxes for his succession.
‘The origin of the world’the legendary painting by the French painter Gustave Courbet painted in 1866, which has generated controversy since then for explicitly portraying a female sex, has been defaced in the Pompidou museum in Metz.
Local media reported that the work, which had been loaned by the Orsay Museum in Paris to this city in northeastern France for an exhibition dedicated to the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacanwas protected by a glass screen when it was attacked.
The newspaper L’Est Republicain indicated that two young people who claimed responsibility for the ‘Metoo’ movement, arrested as soon as they completed their action, are the alleged perpetrators.
‘The Origin of the World’ is one of the most emblematic paintings in the history of painting, both for its artistic value and for the controversy it has generated, accused by some of being indecent and “outrage to religious morality”.
Acquired in 1866 by an Ottoman diplomat named Khalil-Bey, after an unclear journey, Jacques Lacan bought it in 1955, although he did not make it public.
The work passed into the hands of the French State after the death of the thinker, in 1981, in payment of taxes for his inheritance.
Even when it began to be exhibited at the Orsay Museum in 1995, that gallery placed it in a separate room and subjected it to intensive surveillance, as the management feared the reactions it might provoke.
The work continues to scandalize in the 21st century, as demonstrated by the fact that the social network Facebook canceled without prior notice the profile of a French Internet user who had used that image as a profile photo.
