If you've ever been to a museum with a child, this video probably represents your worst nightmare:
It shows a 12-year-old boy in Taiwan trip and stumble onto a 350-year-old Paolo Porpora oil on canvas painting called Flowers. The boy ripped a fist-sized hole in the painting, which is valued at $1.5 million.
Oops.
Luckily, The Guardian reports:
"The organizers will not ask the boy's family to pay for the restoration costs, according to Focus Taiwan news. It said the exhibition organizer, Sun Chi-hsuan, said the boy was very nervous but should not be blamed and the painting, part of a private collection, was insured. ... "The exhibition, which also includes portraits of Leonardo, shows 55 paintings in Taiwan 'gathered from the finest art collectors in the world', according to the organizers. " 'All 55 paintings in the venue are authentic pieces and they are very rare and precious,' a post on the exhibition's Facebook page said. 'Once these works are damaged, they are permanently damaged.' "
We'd like to remind the boy that sometimes accidents turn out fortuitous.
Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.
