Youth Demand supporters target Picasso masterpiece ‘Motherhood’ in pro-Palestine protest

Youth Demand supporters have pasted a photo of a mother and child in the Gaza Strip above a Picasso masterpiece in the National Gallery.

The two protesters walked into room 43 of the gallery just before noon and pasted the photo over the protective glass of the Motherhood painting.

The pair then poured red paint on the floor of the gallery before police were called and arrested them.

The photo, showing a Gaza mother holding her injured child as she lies under the rubble, was taken by Palestinian journalist Ali Jadallah.

The campaign group, which emerged from the student arm of Just Stop Oil, says it is calling for a mutual arms embargo on Israel and for the new UK government to halt all new oil and gas permits granted since 2021.

A spokesperson for the National Gallery said no damage had been caused to the paintings in the room, but confirmed it was currently closed to the public due to the incident.

It is the latest in a long line of stunts performed by protesters at the gallery: Just Stop Oil activists twice threw soup over two paintings by Vincent van Gogh.

The campaign group says it is calling for a mutual arms embargo on Israel and for the new British government to halt all new oil and gas permits granted since 2021.

The pair also threw red paint on the gallery floor

One of the activists involved in the stunt was 23-year-old Jai Halai, an NHS worker from London.

He said: “I am taking action with Youth Demand because at this point it has been over a year since my healthcare colleagues have been decimated. Decimated by bombs, by bullets and by having to operate, without medical equipment, on starving children.

“We need a mutual arms embargo against Israel now; 87% of the British public want this and never before have they been so disillusioned with our government and the political class not representing us. We need a revolution in our democracy.

“Direct action has given us our rights and is the only way to move toward proper justice. Civil resistance is our duty as young people: to defend those who have no voice today and to defend our future. It’s time to take to the streets; let the revolution come.’

The intended artwork was painted by the famous Spanish artist in 1901 and depicts a mother cradling a naked child, its long limbs folded in her embrace as if still in the womb.

Also participating was Monday-Malachi Rosenfeld, a 21-year-old Politics and International Relations student, who said: “I am taking action because as a Jew I feel it is my duty to address the genocide being committed in Gaza .

“I want the world to know that this is not in the Jewish name and I want to see a free Palestine. When Keir Starmer says Britain is behind Israel, he is wrong.

“We know full well that this is genocide, not ‘self-defence’, and we as the British people say enough is enough.”

Last month, two activists from the group spray-painted the words ‘Genocide Conference’ on the main entrance to the Labor Party conference.

Police were called to the gallery and arrested the two protesters

Two supporters of the Youth Demand organization are pictured holding a spray can with the words ‘Genocide Conference’ on the main entrance to the Labor Party conference

Three Just Stop Oil supporters threw soup on two of Van Gogh’s paintings in the National Gallery’s ‘Poets and Lovers’ exhibition after fellow activists were jailed for doing the same in 2022

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In October 2022, Phoebe Plummer, 23, (left) and fellow activist Anna Holland, 22, (right) threw two cans of Heinz soup at Sunflowers at the National Gallery in London.

The paintings were removed from the exhibition and examined by a conservator who said they are unharmed

Protesters spray-painted the words on 12 windows before security noticed at the conference in Liverpool. They were then tackled by plainclothes police officers and arrested.

The group’s latest stunt comes a month after supporters of sister organization Just Stop Oil threw soup over two paintings by Vincent van Gogh.

Their actions came on the same day that fellow activists Phoebe Plummer, 23, and Anna Holland, 22, were jailed for doing the same to famed painter’s masterpiece Sunflowers.

After covering the paintings with soup, the three activists took off their jackets to reveal Just Stop Oil t-shirts and one said: ‘Future generations will view these prisoners of conscience as being on the right side of history.’

Just Stop Oil later revealed the three activists as community worker Phil Green, 24, from Cornwall, retired professor Ludi Simpson, 71, from Bradford and grandmother Mary Patricia Somerville, 77, from Bradford.

The National Gallery confirmed that the three activists have been arrested and the paintings remain unharmed.

Plummer and Holland were jailed for two years and 20 months respectively for damaging the artwork’s gold frame to the tune of £10,000 when they displayed it at London’s National Gallery just under two years ago.

Gallery staff inspected the painting, worth up to £72.5 million, and its frame for damage while the women were still attached to the wall, and were concerned that the soup may have dripped through the protective glass.

The pair had been to the museum in Trafalgar Square the day before the incident and bought the cans of soup at a Tesco supermarket in central London.

They denied but were convicted by a jury of damaging property after a four-day trial at Southwark Crown Court.

Plummer said she had “made peace” with her decision and smiled as she was given her sentence.