Rain poured into a gallery at the Uffizi in Florence on Thursday, splashing down the protective case of Caravaggio’s Bacchus (c. 1598). The museum says that, after torrential rain, there was a leak from beneath a skylight in a room containing the Caravaggio and six other paintings. An inspection confirmed that none of the artworks have been damaged, the Uffizi says. The room reopened on Friday. Also in Florence, the downpour of 45mm in an hour caused flooding at the Palazzo Pitti, which is managed by the Uffizi, forcing some exhibition areas to close, Art News reports.
President Trump has again threatened to demolish the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., as the legal battle surrounding its renaming and renovation continues. The renewed threat, first made in August, came after the Center’s board voted for a third time on Tuesday in favour of closing the building for two years, a move that was blocked by US district court judge Chrisopher Cooper in May. On Wednesday, the president was photographed through the windows of Air Force One reading a poster that appeared to read ‘Kennedy Center DEMOLISHED’. On Thursday, Judge Cooper ordered the Trump administration to give at least 30 days’ notice for any changes to construction plans, including demolition.
The United States has returned 58 cultural artefacts to China. At a handover ceremony at the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C., representatives from US Homeland Security’s Cultural Property, Art and Antiquities Program returned fossils, ceramics, artworks and sacred items, including a statue of Bodhisattva looted from Shanxi Province more than a century ago. Xie Feng, Chinese ambassador to the United States, praised the return as a positive demonstration of China-US cooperation, Global Times reports.
Russia’s most famous icon, the Trinity by Andrei Rublev (15th century), may be damaged after its climate-control casing malfunctioned. The fragile tempera-on-wood icon depicting three angels visiting the prophet Abraham was moved in 2023, on the orders of Vladimir Putin, from the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow to the UNESCO-listed Trinity-St. Sergius Lavra monastery just outside the city. On 12 September, Russian radio station Ekho shared reports from an anonymous source that humidity levels in the work’s casing had reached 80 per cent (the desired level is 50–55 per cent). The nun who leads the Moscow Patriarchate’s legal department, Ksenia Chernega, told RBC that a copy has been placed in the casing while the icon is restored.
