Her assailant carried a framed canvas portrait of Abramović that he used to hit the artist over the head. She was reportedly shaken but unharmed following the incident. The gallery’s director Arturo Galansino posted on Instagram a selfie with Abramović, captioning it, “We’re fine! Everything is fine!”
The caption continued, “Marina Abramović is well and has not suffered any physical harm,” the statement continues. “After checking with the police, she left Palazzo Strozzi with serenity. Immediately after the event she wanted to meet the aggressor for a direct confrontation on the reasons for this action.”
The attacker is reported to be a 51-year-old artist living in Florence. The mayor of Florence, Dario Nardella, tweeted that the man was “not new to this type of gesture.”
In an interview with Italian newspaper La Repubblica, Abramović described the circumstances surrounding the attack.
“Among the crowd, there was a man who was carrying a distorted painting of my face,” she said. “He approached me looking into my eyes and I smiled at him thinking that it was a gift for me. In a split second, I saw his expression change and become violent, coming towards me very quickly and forcefully. The dangers always come very quickly, like death itself.”
She also talked about her conversation with the attacker after the incident.
“The first thing I asked for was: I want to talk to him, I want to know why he did it,” she said. “Why does he hate me?” When Abramović confronted the man, who she says she had never met before, he told her “I had to do it for my art.”
“Violence against others doesn’t make art.”
See a video of the attack below: