Man in wig throws cake at glass to protect the Mona Lisa at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France

As the Paris prosecutor announced on Monday, the 36-year-old man was arrested after the incident on Sunday and admitted to a police psychiatric ward. An investigation has been launched into the damage to cultural assets.

Videos posted on social media showed a young man in a wig and lipstick arriving in a wheelchair. The man, whose identity was unknown, was also seen throwing roses at limp guests in the museum gallery.

The cake attack left a conspicuous white creamy smear on the glass, but Leonardo da Vinci’s famous work was not damaged.

Security guards were filmed escorting the wig-wearing man away as he yelled at the surprised visitors in the gallery, “Think of Earth! There are people destroying the earth! Think about it. Artists tell you: Think of the earth. That’s why I did it.”

The guards were then filmed cleaning the cake out of the jar. A statement from the Louvre confirmed the attack on the artwork, which was about a “patisserie”.

The Renaissance masterpiece from the 16th century has seen a lot in the more than 500 years of its existence.

The painting was stolen by a museum employee in 1911, an event that increased the painting’s international fame. It was also damaged in an acid attack by a vandal in the 1950s and has been kept behind glass ever since.

In 2009, a Russian woman, angry at not being able to get French citizenship, threw a ceramic mug at it, smashing the mug but damaging neither the glass nor the painting.