What could speak more beautifully to the love of humanity for one of its greatest artists than leaving big, wet, sloppy, red lipstick kisses all over his tomb?
This is what people have been doing to the grave of Oscar Wilde for years … so much so that the constant cleaning and “de-greasing” of the monument to the author in the Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris is starting to erode the statue, reports The Guardian. The memorial—a sculpture of a flying naked angel —was also vandalized once when someone stole it’s genitalia.
And while it doesn’t seem so much like vandalism to leave a kiss, the erosion those smooch marks and subsequent cleanings were causing was worrisome enough that the office of public works in Dublin has stepped in to pay for a radical cleaning— and a glass barrier between it and the public.
Prediction: the kisses will now end up on the glass.
And that seems fair. It won’t damage the monument, it will allow adoring fans to leave a smooch behind that can be easily and safely removed and most importantly, Oscar would very likely approve of further lip marks. Who wouldn’t want to be kissed endlessly into eternity?
Indeed, who better deserves to be?
This is what people have been doing to the grave of Oscar Wilde for years … so much so that the constant cleaning and “de-greasing” of the monument to the author in the Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris is starting to erode the statue, reports The Guardian. The memorial—a sculpture of a flying naked angel —was also vandalized once when someone stole it’s genitalia.
And while it doesn’t seem so much like vandalism to leave a kiss, the erosion those smooch marks and subsequent cleanings were causing was worrisome enough that the office of public works in Dublin has stepped in to pay for a radical cleaning— and a glass barrier between it and the public.
Prediction: the kisses will now end up on the glass.
And that seems fair. It won’t damage the monument, it will allow adoring fans to leave a smooch behind that can be easily and safely removed and most importantly, Oscar would very likely approve of further lip marks. Who wouldn’t want to be kissed endlessly into eternity?
Indeed, who better deserves to be?