In October 2022 two young activists did something entirely unexpected. They smuggled tomato soup into the National Gallery, removed their jumpers to reveal t-shirts reading ‘Just Stop Oil’, and threw soup all over Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ 1888 – a priceless piece of art.
Last week they were sentenced to a combined 3 and ½ years in prison for this act.
However, rather than this harsh sentence serving as a deterrent, ‘Solidarity with Soup Throwers’ fast became a rallying call across the world. On the day of Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland’s sentencing, soup was thrown at British embassies in Germany, Poland, Sweden, Norway, Switzerland, Canada and Australia. And within hours of the judgement, three more Just Stop Oil (JSO) activists had once again covered ‘Sunflowers’ in soup.
How did we get here?
On October 14th 2022 JSO activists, Phoebe Plummer and Anna Holland, threw tomato soup on Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ to raise awareness about the climate crisis. As soon as the soup was thrown, they glued their hands to the wall and turned to someone recording the action and asked:
“What is worth more, art or life?”
Their protest was never intended to cause harm, rather to shock, to challenge, to prompt us all to question – during a climate crisis, what are our priorities? As Plummer said to camera,
“Are you more concerned about the protection of a painting, or the protection of our planet and people?”
Their protest asked whether the act of throwing soup on a painting would evoke more international outrage, than energy corporations spilling oil into water supplies and pouring CO2e into our atmosphere? They were challenging each of us to think about what harm really looks like, and what is really worth protecting. As Just Stop Oil (JSO) spokesperson Graham Buss has recently stated,
“When Phoebe and Anna said, “what’s more important: art or life?”, they weren’t saying art’s not important. What they’re saying is that life is more important”
The actions of these two young activists inspired similar protests against the fossil fuel industry across the world. In Germany protesters threw mashed potato at a Monet, in Canada maple syrup was cast on a painting by Emily Carr and in Paris, the Mona Lisa herself was souped. Unpopular as soup throwing and slow marching might be, JSO’s demand for no new oil and gas licences have since been promised by the Labour government in their 2024 manifesto. And, despite many condemning JSO’s tactics, they have undoubtedly succeeded in sparking global conversations about climate protest and the boundaries of justifiability and non-violence when the stakes are existential and truly priceless. Indeed, protest in all its forms is key to keeping the climate crisis in public consciousness and among government priorities.
Yet, just last week, on September 27th 2024, Plummer and Holland were sentenced to serve 24 months, and 20 months in prison, respectively, for their act of throwing soup on art. The presiding judge, Judge Hehir added an additional three months onto Plummer’s prison sentence for slow marching down Earls Court Road in November 2023. 3 months of prison time for walking down a road for 20 minutes.
This is the second time this year Judge Hehir has sentenced JSO climate activists to prison time. In July he handed out the longest prison sentences that peaceful protesters have ever received in England. For the crime of ‘conspiracy to cause a public nuisance’ with regards to the M25 motorway disruption in November 2022 he sentenced 5 protestors to a combined 21 years in prison. The harshness of this verdict follows his banning the protestors’ motivations from being heard by the jury – dismissing their climate considerations as ‘neither here nor there’ in relation to their actions. This dismissal of the climate catastrophe and the risks to life it poses were reiterated in the trial and sentencing of Plummer and Holland.
In his sentencing of Plummer last week Judge Hehir stated:
“The action you took was extreme, disproportionate and criminally idiotic, given the risks involved. This is not a case for merciful sentencing. Rather, sentences must be imposed which both adequately punish you for what you did, and what you risked, and which will deter others whose motivations may incline them to similar behaviour.”
He even classed the harm the pair had caused as ‘Category 1’ – the highest possible level of harm. In his own words ‘because of the substantial social impact involved. Any attack on priceless art which is on public display can have very harmful societal consequences.’ Yet, the very basis of this statement is legally flawed. The crime Plummer and Holland were found guilty of was criminal damage to the frame not ‘Sunflowers’ itself. The ‘attack’ as Judge Hehir phrased it, never occurred, and the defendants had not been found guilty of it.
Furthermore, these statements by Judge Hehir indicate his serious miscalculation of the situation at hand, in 2 major ways.
First: Risk, and ‘very harmful societal consequences’
While the frame housing Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ was unfortunately damaged by the slight acidity of the soup thrown in 2022, ‘Sunflowers’, protected by a glass panel, was never at risk. The maximum estimation of monetary damage incurred by soup erosion to the frame sits around £10,000. Meanwhile, owing to states’, including Great Britain’s, failure to meaningfully address the climate crisis, in the last week alone we have seen catastrophic flooding in Britain, and hurricanes in the USA, claiming lives and incurring billions of pounds in damage. Climate criminals should indeed receive custodial sentences, but non-violent soup wielders are not the real climate criminals.
The day after Plummer and Holland’s sentencing, Hurricane Helene hit North Carolina, tearing down bridges, roads and homes, and resulting in at least 130 casualties so far. Helene’s particularly destructive nature was a direct result of the climate crisis. The hurricane was over 400 miles wide, and especially powerful owing to the exceptionally warm ocean she crossed before reaching North Carolina. Though it will take weeks for the full value of all that has been lost to become clear, current estimates place economic losses between $3 and $160billion. But more importantly, lives were lost, and life is priceless.
Helene was not the first, nor will it be the last devastating manifestation of the climate crisis in action. The same day Judge Hehir gave Plummer an extra 3 months prison time for the disruption to traffic they caused slow marching down a London road, over 180 flood warnings were issued across the UK. Several roads across England were so severely flooded drivers had to be rescued from their cars. This, not slow marching, is what real and inevitable climate disruption to national infrastructure looks like.
Hehir’s conception of what is ‘extreme, disproportionate and criminally idiotic’, in this light, appears misled and curiously myopic.
Second: The strength of solidarity with soup throwers
Judge Hehir was explicit in stating that the sentences he issued were deliberately harsh to ‘deter others [from] similar behaviour’. Yet, far from putting people off from taking nonviolent action, the sentencing attracted hundreds of peaceful protestors, global solidarity, and even inspired an immediate identical action.
As the soup throwers’ sentences were announced, hundreds sat gathered, silently outside Southwark Court. They held placards depicting wrongfully imprisoned peaceful protesters. This action was led by Defend Our Juries, in defiance of the increasingly draconian treatment of non-violent protesters in the UK, especially judgements given out by Judge Hehir. They protested not only Plummer and Holland’s sentencing, but the miscarriage of justice served to the Whole Truth Five. Defend Our Juries were joined in solidarity by protestors from dozens of London groups, JSO, Extinction Rebellion, Fossil Free London and Climate Resistance to name a few. This show of solidarity to those in court and in prison speaks to the persistence and resilience of climate activists. Quite simply, the turnout and cross movement solidarity shows it doesn’t matter the deterrents, when the cause is protection of life on earth – the cause outweighs the cost.
Indeed, there was global outrage at the sentencing. In solidarity with the original soup throwers, activists across Europe, Australia and Canada threw soup at British embassy buildings and stood shoulder to shoulder with banners reading ‘Solidarity with Soup throwers’.
Similarly, in London, just hours after the sentencing, another round of soup was thrown at Van Gogh’s ‘Sunflowers’ 1888 and ‘Sunflowers’ 1889 by JSO activists. Phil Green, one of the soup throwers 2.0 explained why they took action:
“Whilst deadly flooding, food shortages and extreme heat wreak havoc around the world, the state is choosing to focus energy on prosecuting ordinary people with the harshest sentences. Future generations will see those who stood up against suffering, genocide and greed as heroes and our reckless governments as the real criminals.”
Judge Hehir failed immediately and publicly in his goal to deter future similar actions. Instead, his miscomprehension of the stakes at hand, and disproportionate (and legally dubious) punishment of non-violent protesters has galvanised climate activists, across groups, across networks, and across continents. The people truly do have the power.
Solidarity with Soup Throwers.
Be Curious!
- Ask yourself who you think is really a ‘climate criminal’? And let us know what you think on our instagram, @curious.earth.hq.
- Read about the effect of ‘radical’ protest on public perceptions of the climate crisis.
- Donate to a fundraiser in support of the young protesters bringing attention to the climate crisis.
Featured image by Markus Spiske, via Unsplash.
