The Shoah Museum in Rome has acquired a piece by reserved contemporary pop artist aleXsandro Palombo after it was defaced in an apparent act of antisemitism.

The mural, which depicts Liliana Segre and Sami Modiano, the last two Italian survivors of Auschwitz, was defaced multiple times and even erased by vandals.

Segre and Modiano are shown in striped clothing under green bullet-proof vests with yellow Stars of David on them, and there are even representations of the serial numbers tattooed on them by the Nazis. The perpetrators vandalized Segre and Modiano’s faces, as well as the stars on their chests, but left the numbers on their arms untouched.

"They took away my face, my identity, they erased the yellow star, but they left the number tattooed on my arm," Segre said.

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Palombo eventually reproduced the piece, and it is now part of the museum’s permanent collection.

"Art is the highest expression of freedom, and repeatedly attacking a work that portrays two survivors of Auschwitz highlights how the very value of democracy and all our freedoms is in danger," Palombo said in a statement. "The gesture of courage and resistance of the Shoah Museum of Rome and the Italian Jewish community is a great and precious lesson in civilization for all of us, who responded to the antisemitic violence and hatred of these new forms of social and cultural terrorism with a powerful action of the Risorgimento."

Palombo has made several pieces honoring the Holocaust, and his other works have not been spared from vandalism.

A piece entitled "Arbeit macht frei," which shows Hungarian writer and Holocaust survivor Edith Bruck wrapped in an Israeli flag was also defaced, with much of the flag being erased. The title of this mural is the same phrase the Nazis put on the gates of Auschwitz, and it translates to "work makes you free."

Bruck told Italian newspaper La Stampa that she was saddened but not surprised by the vandalism, saying that "antisemitism is a tsunami."

The mural of Bruck has also been acquired by the Shoah Museum in Rome.

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Another one of Palombo’s pieces that was vandalized was entitled "Halt! Stoj!," which depicted Segre, Modiano and Burk alongside Pope Francis, who is outfitted with a cross and a sign reading "antisemitism is everywhere." The four are depicted as Simpsons characters, a common motif for Palombo. While the image of the pope was not damaged, vandals defaced the Stars of David on the three Holocaust survivors.

Palombo, a contemporary pop artist and activist, used pop culture references in his artwork, including celebrities and cartoon characters from the Simpsons and Disney. One of his most iconic works is the "Simpsons deported to Auschwitz," which shows Marge, Homer, Maggie, Bart and Lisa before and after the concentration camp, referencing the emaciated state of Holocaust survivors liberated from Nazi camps.

President Donald Trump announced on Friday he decided to immediately fire multiple Kennedy Center board members, including the chairman, and fill that role himself.

Trump claimed he and current chair David Rubenstein "do not share [the same] Vision for a Golden Age in Arts and Culture," according to the announcement on Truth Social.

He said a new board would be announced soon, adding the new chairman, naming himself, is "amazing."

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"Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth — THIS WILL STOP," Trump wrote in the post. 

The Kennedy Center in October hosted a Dancing Queens Drag Brunch at its Roof Terrace Restaurant in October, featuring Washington, D.C.'s "most fabulous drag performers," according to its website.

The October event featured 2024 Capital Pride Honoree, Tula, and other drag performers "representing the diversity of D.C.’s queer community," according to the site.

Tickets were sold for nearly $100 each, with reservations required, and included bottomless mimosas.

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Following Trump's announcement, the Kennedy Center's website limited users, citing "high traffic."

Hundreds of visitors had to queue in an online waiting room to view the site.

In his post, Trump called the center "an American jewel," and said it must reflect the nation's "brightest stars" on its stage.

"At my direction, we are going to make the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., GREAT AGAIN," the President wrote. "For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!"

It is unclear which Board of Trustees members have been canned, as of Friday night.

Experts at a New York-based art data science firm believe a long-lost piece by Vincent van Gogh was sold at a garage sale in Minnesota and recently published a report about its investigation.

In a Jan. 28 news release, LMI Group International announced the publication of a 450-page report on a painting called "Elimar," which it believes is a van Gogh original. 

The painting was bought at a Minnesota garage sale for $50 in 2016, and, according to The Wall Street Journal, it could be worth as much as $15 million.

Experts believe the painting was done while the artist was a patient of the Saint-Paul sanitarium in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence between May 1889 and May 1890. It was found with "E L I M A R" on the front of the canvas.

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The report describes the piece, which measures 45.7 by 41.9 centimeters, as an "emotionally rich, profoundly personal work created during the final and tumultuous chapter of van Gogh's life." 

"In this portrait, van Gogh reimagines himself as an older, wiser man depicted against the serene palette-knife-sculpted sky and smooth expanse of the water, evoking van Gogh’s lifelong personal interest with life at sea," the release stated.

The portrait shows a somber-looking man with a pipe in his mouth and a fur hat standing by the ocean. The painting has "the same three-quarter view of all four van Gogh self-portraits painted in 1889," according to the report.

"'Elimar' features stylistically distinct elements that appear throughout van Gogh’s oeuvre, including distinctive marks under the eyes, marks at the corner of the mouth, eyelashes, ‘whites of the eyes’ often in blue or green, a pronounced nasal-labial line, cursory shorthand describing the tragus and helix, and the color of cuff set off from the sleeve," the statement said.

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Analysts also found that a strand of red hair was partially embedded in the corner of the painting, and scientists confirmed it belonged to a male. The painting also had a finish made of egg white, which van Gogh was known to have used.

Despite the stylistic similarities, the Van Gogh Museum has denied the painting's connection to the famed Dutch artist. In February 2019, LMI Group received this statement from the museum: "We have carefully examined the material you supplied to us and are of the opinion, based on stylistic features, that your work … cannot be attributed to Vincent van Gogh."

In a statement, LMI Group President Lawrence M. Shindell said his organization took a "data-based approach" to verifying the origin of the painting, and that it "represents a new standard of confidence for bringing to light unknown or forgotten works by important artists."

"By integrating science and technology with traditional tools of connoisseurship, historical context, formal analysis, and provenance research, we aim both to expand and tailor the resources available for art authentication based on the unique properties of the works under our care," Shindell said.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Van Gogh Museum for comment.

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