Cecilia Giménez Zueco of Borja in northeast Spain hit the headlines in 2012 when she gave to the world her “putting” restoration of a fresco of Jesus Christ. The work in query, Ecce Homo (“Behold the Man” in Latin) by the Nineteenth-century painter Elias Garcia Martinez, had been housed for greater than 100 years within the Sanctuary of Mercy Church close to Zaragoza. Giménez’s uncommon transforming went viral, incomes the nickname Monkey Christ as a result of the top resembled a bushy monkey (it even impressed a Twitter profile, @eccemono, with its personal hashtags).
Giménez has sadly died, aged 94. In a tribute on Fb, Borja’s mayor, Eduardo Arilla highlighted that in August 2012, she grew to become a world phenomenon because the protagonist of “Ecce Homo de Borja”. “Cecilia, with one of the best intention determined to repaint the work,” he burdened. “The world knew her by way of this anecdote however all of us already knew the nice particular person she was and can stay in our reminiscence.”
On the time, the controversy left Giménez distraught.“I felt devastated,” she instructed The New York Occasions. “They stated it was a loopy, outdated girl who destroyed a portrait that was price some huge cash.”There have been silver linings to the botch job nevertheless. Greater than 150,000 vacationers from everywhere in the world got here to see Giménez’s creative endeavour, boosting the city’s coffers (in response to Artnet Information, the city’s Centro de Interpretación Ecce Homo, opened in 2016, placing the notorious piece in context). Giménez even went on to stage an artwork exhibition in Borja, displaying 28 of her personal work.
