The waters of Rome’s celebrated Trevi fountain turned blood red after an unidentified man threw a can of dye into its basin last week.
Forever immortalized by Anita Ekberg in Fellini’s 1960s classic, la Dolce Vita, and the award winning song and film, Three Coins in a Fountain, the fountain quickly became an incredible spectacle for tourists and curious passersby.
Although officials feared that the deep red dye would permanently damage the Trevi’s marble, the stone has since returned to its original splendor.
Days later, police arrested the unidentified man, who said his act was inspired by the Italian Futurist movement of the early 1900s. Before fleeing the scene, the man left a pile of leaflets signed by ‘FTM Futurist Action 2007’, a right-wing group whose aim is to turn ‘the grey bourgeois society into a triumph of colour’.
The man added that the alleged act of vandalism was also a sign of protest against the Rome Film Festival, in progress at the time.
