Brussels 13.10.2025 Two “bio” activists sprayed red paint on a painting of Christopher Columbus at the Naval Museum in Madrid, Spain. José Garnelo’s painting, “First to Christopher Columbus,” is severely damaged on its left half.

The anniversary of the discovery of America was marked, at the Naval Museum in Madrid by two activists, members of the collective called Futuro Vegetal, vandalized the painting titled “Primer homenaje a Colón, 12 de octubre de 1492, an 1892 work by Spanish artist José Garnelo y Alda (Enguera, 1866 – Montilla, 1944) depicting Christopher Columbus’ arrival on the newly discovered continent.
Unfortunately the painting was not protected by any glass. The incident, immediately claimed by the group on social channels, happened around 2 PM, on October 12, when the two young protesters entered the museum facility and threw the red paint, declared “biodegradable,” on the left section of the large canvas. The same day in the morning, a few hours before the incident, the museum had briefly illustrated the work on its social channels.

🔴 ALERTE INFO | Madrid — Deux activistes ont aspergé de peinture rouge un tableau de Christophe Colomb au Musée naval. 🍅

L’œuvre de José Garnelo, « Premier à Christophe Colomb », est gravement endommagée sur sa moitié gauche. pic.twitter.com/oT6f2eRmkl

— SIRÈNES (@SirenesFR) October 13, 2025

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In a clip released on X, the Futuro Vegetal collective showed the protesters shouting slogans denouncing colonialism: in fact, the group made a direct connection between the commemoration of October 12, which is a national holiday in Spain, and what they claimed was “the oppression that continues to this day” of indigenous peoples. The protesters explicitly stated that the historical legacy of Christopher Columbus symbolizes that same “dispossession and collective suffering” of which the October 12 date would be a symbol. Hence, therefore, occured the idea of striking a painting depicting Columbus in an act of a sheer vandalism.

Immediately after the attack, as seen in the video, Naval Museum staff promptly intervened and managed to stop the vandals, who were later placed under arrest by the National Police. Unfortunately, however, the institute workers were unable to prevent the two women from throwing paint on the work. The damaged painting was covered and immediately removed from the exhibition hall to undergo initial evaluation by expert restorers and then paint removal operations.

The affected work, Primer homenaje a Colón (12 de octubre de 1492), constitutes an oil on canvas of considerable size, reaching three meters in height by six meters in width (300 x 600 cm). It was commissioned and made in 1892 specifically to celebrate the Fourth Centenary of the Discovery of the Americas. The subject depicted is a highly symbolic moment: the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1492 and the tribute that the natives of the New World would pay to the navigator.

The painting’s historical significance is underscored by its history and success: it was exhibited at the International Exhibition of Fine Arts in Chicago also in 1892, where it also won a prize. The work is considered a landmark in the narrative of Spanish history. Currently, the painting is located at the entrance to the Naval Museum of Madrid, where it has been kept since 1981, a facility under the Armada Española that guards a valuable maritime and colonial heritage of the nation.