A rash of attacks on works of art has broken out across Europe, with masterpieces by Leonardo da Vinci, Vincent van Gogh, and Sandro Botticelli serving as magnets for protests by climate change activists, who have taken to gluing themselves to paintings at galleries from Italy to Scotland.

Recent reporting has disclosed that contrary to being lone wolf attacks, these efforts are being funded by some of the most gilded names in philanthropy and America’s cultural firmament: the Gettys and Kennedys. With names adorning bridges and monuments from coast to coast, these families are members of the informal American aristocracy. 

For families that rose to fame and fortune in large part on the gush of oil, this stance involves nothing less than a repudiation of the past in the name of the orthodoxy of the present. It signals a generational shift in the inner sancta of the elite, blessed with deep pockets and possessed of fervent ideological commitment.

The ostensible group behind these protests is a British one, Just Stop Oil. It describes itself as “a coalition of groups working together to ensure that the government commits to ending all new licenses and consents for the exploration, development and production of fossil fuels in the UK.”

Just Stop Oil asserts its “legal right and moral duty to act” when the state is conducting its business “immorally,” in this case by “opening new oil fields.”

On the Frequently Asked Questions section of its website, under the heading, “Who Funds You,” Just Stop Oil acknowledges: “Most of our funding for recruitment, training, capacity building, and education comes from Climate Emergency Fund.” When it comes to how this money is deployed, it explains: “Apart from tea and sandwiches we use the funds to organize, pay for accommodation and travel costs.”

Money for tea and sandwiches, then, is being earmarked by the Climate Emergency Fund. It’s a relatively new outfit, founded, as the Observer reports, in 2019 by “Rory Kennedy, daughter of Senator Robert Kennedy, and Aileen Getty, granddaughter of oil tycoon Jean Paul Getty.” They were joined by a climate activist and investor, Trevor Neilson.

The Climate Emergency Fund has given Just Stop Oil and an allied Italian group, Ultima Generazione, $1 million in the last two years. Its executive director, Margaret Klein Salomon, calls the protest activities at galleries and museums “so awesome,” according to the Observer. 

Mrs. Salomon adds: “People come to this museum to look at this painting, but we need them to look at the reality of the climate emergency instead.” A member of Ultima Generazione, Chloe Bertini, says of the Climate Emergency Fund, “They are funding our whole campaign.”

Aileen’s grandfather, Jean Paul Getty, made his fortune in oil. The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations reports him to have said, “If you can actually count your money, then you are not really a rich man.” Getty was a rich man, named the wealthiest in the world by the Guiness Book of World Records in 1966.

Getty in 1948 famously paid Ibn Saud, the first king of Saudi Arabia, $9.5 million in cash along with other sweeteners for the Saudi Arabian Neutral Zone concession, where oil was discovered in 1953. During the Yom Kippur War of 1973, Getty Oil surged in value. The artistic trust he left behind describes itself as “the world’s largest cultural and philanthropic institution dedicated to the visual arts.”

The Aileen Getty Foundation, funded with the fruits of Getty’s rigs and drills, announced that it “has shifted the bulk of our resources to organizations and individuals addressing the climate emergency.” It has committed to “take an actively anti-racist approach in all of our climate work, prioritizing climate justice,” and to “re-examine our role in supporting systems that perpetuate inequality.”

While the Kennedys may not be as synonymous with the black sticky stuff, America’s most glamorous political dynasty has petrol on its fingerprints. When Rory Kennedy’s uncle — Senator Edward Kennedy — ran for president, the Washington Post noted, “What is not well known is that Kennedy, as an investor, is something of an oilman.”

The Post went on to add: “He and his children own an interest in dozens of oil and gas properties in Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and several other states, at least 39 leases and 101 royalty properties.” These holdings constituted “14 to 17.4 percent of the assets held in blind trust for his immediate family.”

Rory Kennedy’s brother, Joseph, who once served in the House of Representatives, has his own ties to oil. The New York Post reported that the scion “founded Citizens Energy Corp. in 1979 to provide low-cost home heating oil. In the early years, the nonprofit bought crude oil from Venezuela at a special price and sold it off at market rate.”