Urban Myths and Legends

On September 4, 1985, the British tabloid newspaper The Sun reported that a firefighter from Yorkshire was claiming that undamaged copies of the painting were frequently found amidst the ruins of burned houses. He stated that no firefighter would allow a copy of the painting into his own house. Over the next few months, The Sun and other tabloids ran several articles on house fires suffered by people who had owned the painting.

By the end of November, belief in the painting's curse was widespread enough that The Sun was organizing mass bonfires of the paintings, sent in by readers.

To lift the curse it is said you must give the painting to another or reunite the boy and the girl and hang them together, if not then your house will burn. 

Karl Pilkington has made reference to these events on The Ricky Gervais Show.

Steve Punt, British writer and comedian, investigated the "curse" of the crying boy in a BBC radio Four production called Punt PI. Although the programme is comic in nature Punt researches the history of the Crying Boy painting and reveals an intriguing past. The Punt PI page, Crying Boy episode (programme broadcast on Sat 9 Oct 2010, 10:30 on BBC Radio 4). The conclusion reached by the programme, following testing at the Building Research Establishment is that the prints were treated with some varnish containing fire repellent, and that the string holding the painting to the wall would be the first to perish, resulting in the painting landing face down on the floor and thus being protected.

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