Ultima Generazione activists dye Bernini's Barcaccia fountain black in Rome

On April 1, 2023, three activists from the climate group Ultima Generazione poured a charcoal-based liquid into the Barcaccia fountain at the foot of the Spanish Steps in Rome, turning the water black. The fountain, designed by Pietro Bernini with his son Gian Lorenzo Bernini between 1626 and 1629 for Pope Urban VIII, is a major tourist attraction. The activists issued a statement condemning insufficient government policies on global warming and demanding an end to fossil fuel subsidies. Carabinieri and Rome police intervened; the three face vandalism charges. Mayor Roberto Gualtieri and cultural superintendent Claudio Parisi Presicce arrived at the scene; Gualtieri condemned the act as illegal and damaging. Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano called it the latest in a series of vandalism attacks on cultural heritage and announced a new law to make perpetrators pay for restoration costs. The action follows a similar protest in Florence at Palazzo Vecchio. The Barcaccia has been vandalized before: in 2007 by four drunk individuals with a screwdriver, and in 2015 by Dutch hooligans throwing glass bottles. Ultima Generazione also protested in Ancona the same day, covering the 16th-century Fontana del Calamo with a tarp.