The mayor of the Italian city of Florence, Dario Nardella, confronted two activists who threw paint on the facade of Palazzo Vecchio, one of the most emblematic buildings from the capital of Tuscany.

The protest action, carried out by two activists from the Última Generación group, was stopped almost instantly by municipal police and by the mayor himself Florentino -who was a few meters away recording an institutional video-, who withdrew one of the young people shouting: “What the hell are you doing?”.

A video broadcast by ‘Corriere della Sera’ shows how Nardella came running towards one of the activists who was painting the façade of the building -which dates from the 14th century and houses the city hall- and pushed him while asking for explanations about his performance.

After being subdued by the Municipal Police and booed by tourists, one of the activists justified his action by stating that he wanted to “sanction a building that is a symbol of power.” According to him, it was a way of protest against the lack of measures taken against climate change by the Government of Italy.

The cleaning of the building’s façade began immediately afterwards, work to which the mayor of Florence himself helped with a brush and a water pressure machine, even mounted on a scaffold.

“The attack on art, culture and beauty, powerless in the face of violence and standing up for the good of humanity, can never justify fighting for a causenot even the most acceptable,” Nardella later expressed on his Twitter profile.

This is not the first time that Última Generación has carried out a protest act of this type. Last June, two activists they stuck with glue in ‘La Primavera’the painting by Sandro Botticelli in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence.