Artist says it with balls

FIVE hundred thousand brightly coloured plastic balls yesterday bounced down the Spanish Steps in Rome in a stunt by an anarchic artist.

The balls were sent cascading down the city’s famed Spanish Steps in the latest stunt orchestrated by the man who months ago dyed the Trevi Fountain red.

Graziano Cecchini, the man behind the Trevi Fountain stunt, and several others emptied bags full of red, green, yellow and blue balls down the 18th-century steps.

Police said they arrived in three trucks filled with hundreds of bags.

He claimed it had cost him about £15,000 (€20,000) to turn the Spanish Steps into a scene from a children’s playground.

The balls bounced down the steps, filling the boat-shaped Barcaccia fountain in the piazza below. Delighted tourists grabbed the balls as mementoes.

As Mr Cecchini walked down the steps, with balls bouncing around him, he added: “I am leaving for Burma, these balls will help the Karen people.”

The Karen, an ethnic minority descended from Tibetan refugees, have fought for an independent state since 1949 and accuse the military junta of ethnic cleansing.

Street cleaners later shovelled the balls into trucks and hosed down the stairs to remove strays.

Cecchini said that he uses “art if we want to call it art to stress our malaise”.

Cecchini and three others were detained by police.