The unnamed man reportedly did not show up for work for several days after the incident and switched off his phone as he was “very upset about what happened”, according to Ms Reshetkina.
Local media reported that although the room was packed with CCTV cameras, the Yeltsin Centre originally rejected suggestions that it was an inside job and filed the police report only two weeks later.
Detail of the painting “Three Figures” by Anna Leporskaya, after being vandalised seen in The Art Newspaper Russia.
The Yekaterinburg police last week reported the arrest without providing any details but said the suspect was “quite aggressive and made it clear he did not like the investigation”.
The suspect faces a hefty fine or three months in jail if found guilty.
Anna Leposkaya, born in Kyiv in 1900, was a well-known student of Malevich, one of the fathers of abstract art.
Russia’s The Art Newspaper reported that the damage was not irreversible thanks to the man’s soft stroke even though the pen’s ink penetrated the paint layer, and the insurance company that valued the painting at £750,0000 has agreed to pay about £2500 for its restoration.
The canvas has been taken to Moscow for restoration work. The Yeltsin Centre has since put up protective screens over the remaining works of the avant-garde exhibition where Leporskaya’s work was displayed.
Russia has a history of vandals defacing works of art while claiming they felt disturbed by them.
In 2018, a man at Moscow’s Tretyakov Gallery attacked a 19th-century painting by renowned Russian artist Ilya Repin with a stanchion, leaving holes in the canvas.
The man, from southern Russia, said in court he had a shot of vodka at the museum’s canteen and thought the painting that depicts Russia’s first tsar cradling his dying son after striking him in a fit of rage smeared Ivan the Terrible whom he regarded as a saint.
The Tretyakov Gallery said it was so shocked by the violent attack that it was considering hiring psychologists to help pick out potentially dangerous visitors.
Telegraph, London
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Russian security guard blamed for drawing eyes on prized painting
Source: Philippines Alive
