Attack on Museum Island: olive oil in the Nefertiti Hall

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Damaged sarcophagus in the Neues Museum in Berlin

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HAYOUNG JEON / EPA-EFE / Shutterstock

When one or more perpetrators carried out an attack on the art on Berlin's Museum Island on October 3rd, i.e. on the day of German reunification, in addition to floors, walls and showcases, 70 objects were also contaminated with an oily liquid - it was probably olive oil , sure to be a "natural vegetable oil".

Some artifacts have already been cleaned, but 50 works need to be restored.

This emerges from a detailed analysis requested by the Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters.

The corresponding statement by the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (SMB) is available to SPIEGEL.

Three historical exhibition buildings were affected, the New Museum, the Pergamon Museum and the Old National Gallery.

Embarrassing: Video recordings from several cameras in the Neues Museum were not saved, they were, according to the report, "failed unnoticed" after a "software update of the video server in September".

Only the camera in the north dome worked, but the images did not provide any information.

If you follow the report, the security of museums is fundamentally bad: The authors expressly point out that the price played a decisive role in the last tender for the external security service.

It is emphasized that this should be handled differently in the future: In the next call for tenders, which would be due in 2021, the "award criteria" should be both price and technical criteria.

"If you save at the wrong end, you end up paying more"

Simone Barrientos, cultural politician of the Left, told SPIEGEL: "The fact that security services are being outsourced is highly problematic."

Barrientos is reminiscent of the spectacular theft on Museum Island in 2017. "I don't want to accuse anyone, but: When the gold coin was stolen from the Bode Museum, a security guard employed by a temporary employment agency was convicted and gave the perpetrators decisive information. The fact that subcontractors in the security industry usually pay the lowest wages poses a security risk. If you save at the wrong end, you end up paying more. "

An SPD politician and expert on the paper said that it was "written in a targeted manner".

Minister of State for Culture Grütters ammunition.

As is well known, she has in mind the destruction of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, to which the museums are subject.

Remarkably, however, the von Grütters department, of all people, had rejected an application in August that had been submitted by the State Museums.

In early summer, they asked for 1.3 million euros from the new fund for infrastructure measures.

They should serve security.

Christina Haak, Vice-Head of the State Museums, told SPIEGEL that a whole package had been proposed.

Grütters told SPIEGEL that the request could not be considered "due to the nature of the program" and that other means could be used for security measures.

"A lack of money is not the problem in this area".

The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, which is superordinate to the museums, has not even spent 6.4 million euros in building maintenance funds from 2019, according to Grütters.

For 2020 she would have another million euros available.

"You can use the money immediately for these measures, you don't need any extra funds."  

In the "statement on damage caused by vandalism", which Grütters is now and will also be debated Wednesday in the culture committee, a likely time of the crime is mentioned in the late afternoon of October 3rd.

The security service was fully manned in the "12-hour shift".

The supervisors in the museums would not have observed or registered the process themselves.

The first traces of oil were discovered at 4.40 p.m., and much more damage was found by midnight.

The Holy of Holies on Museum Island was not spared either, the Nefertiti Hall in the Neues Museum.

There the floor was polluted.

The report does not reveal when the general director of the national museums showed up.

But he did not inform his chief employer, the President of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, until October 4th.

Monika Grütters' authority was informed on October 6th.

The public only found out about the attack on art last week - a fact that is not further explained in the report.

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