The director of Russia’s state-run Tretyakov Gallery says Ilya Repin's painting of Ivan the Terrible will be displayed in a special protective glass case after it was damaged by a vandal.
Tretyakov Gallery Director Zelfira Tregulova announced the special protection for the painting -- titled Ivan The Terrible And His Son Ivan On November 16th, 1581 -- after it was seriously damaged on May 25 by a man who used a metal fence post to smash the painting's previous protective glass and rip the canvas.
Russia’s Sberbank said on May 28 that it would fund restoration efforts that could cost up to $160,000.
Police from Russia’s Interior Ministry detained the man and brought a criminal case against him.
Russia’s TASS news agency quoted an unnamed law enforcement official as saying the perpetrator was a 37-year-old man from Voronezh who attacked the painting because of the "falsehood of the historical facts depicted on the canvas."
The painting, from 1885, depicts Ivan the Terrible holding his son after mortally wounding him in a fit of rage.
It is considered the most psychologically intense of Repin’s paintings -- an expression of the artist's revolt against violence and bloodshed.
