QUIRKY WORLD ... Town paints new picture after fresco fracas

SPAIN: Three years after a botched fresco restoration by an octogenarian painter became a major tourist attraction for the Spanish town of Borja, officials are looking to capitalise on the phenomenon with an information centre that documents the fresco’s notoriety and aims to attract more visitors.

Borja Mayor Eduardo Arilla said some 160,000 people had come to see the fresco since Cecilia Gimenez’s restoration of a Christ fresco in a town sanctuary went viral in 2012. He said with the new centre, they hoped to draw some 30,000 visitors annually.

Arilla said the aim is to give the painting “a new impulse”. The centre brings together newspaper clippings, photographs, and videos documenting the fresco’s story.