Photos: ‘Bloodied Snakes’ Stage ‘Die-In’ at Somerset House Over LVMH’s Torment of Wild Animals
3 September 2024
Photos: ‘Bloodied Snakes’ Stage ‘Die-In’ at Somerset House Over LVMH’s Torment of Wild Animals
London – Today, five “bloodied” PETA supporters dressed in “snakeskin” lay sprawled across the LVMH Great Room exhibition space in The Courtauld Gallery at London’s iconic Somerset House, while another supporter held a sign reading, “Artists create. LVMH kills,” as they staged a “die-in” to protest fashion house LVMH’s continued use of wild animals’ skin in its collections. The action follows various protests by PETA entities at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, including crashing Pharrell Williams’ kick-off party and a projection takeover of top Paris landmarks urging LVMH – one of the Games’ sponsors – to ban fur and wild-animal skins.
Footage and more images are available here and here.
“No one should die for art or fashion, yet every crocodile handbag or pair of snakeskin shoes represents the senseless killing of a vulnerable animal who felt fear and pain,” says PETA Senior Campaigns Manager Kate Werner. “PETA is calling on LVMH to cut cruelty from its collections by ending its shameful sale of wild animals’ skin and fur.”
A PETA Asia investigation into slaughterhouses in Indonesia that supply LVMH shows snakes being inflated with water, bashed with hammers, and cut open with razors while they were likely still conscious. PETA entities have also documented how in the fashion industry, workers hack at crocodiles’ necks and shove metal rods down their spines, chop off conscious lizards’ heads with machetes, and electrically stun ostriches before slitting their throats in full view of their terrified flockmates. Animals raised and killed for fur are confined to filthy, cramped wire cages before they’re electrocuted, bludgeoned, gassed, or even skinned alive.
PETA notes that other major designers – including Mulberry, Victoria Beckham, Chanel, Burberry, Diane von Furstenberg, and Vivienne Westwood – have banned using the skin of reptiles or other wildlife, while nearly all top luxury fashion houses have banned the use of fur.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, X, TikTok, or Instagram.
Contact:
Lucy Watson +44 (0) 20 7837 6327; [email protected]
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