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# Bizarre Gun Accident at Met Museum
- URL: https://hyperallergic.com/bizarre-gun-accident-at-met-museum/
- Published: 2012-04-20T22:49:07.000Z
- Updated: 2025-11-24T16:36:42.000Z
- Description: "A security guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art accidentally shot himself in the leg while cleaning his gun inside the famed Upper East Side institution this afternoon … A spokesman for the museum described the accidental shooting in a locker room as a 'freak accident' and said the public was ne
- Author: Hrag Vartanian
- Tags: Opinion, guns, Metropolitan Museum of Art, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 06:51 (2012, 2013, part 1)

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2012/04/burden-met-museum-home.jpg)

A doctored screenshot of Chris Burden's "Shoot" (1971)

“A security guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art accidentally shot himself in the leg while cleaning his gun inside the famed Upper East Side institution this afternoon … A spokesman for the museum described the accidental shooting in a locker room as a ‘freak accident’ and said the public was never in any danger.” \[[*New York Post*](http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/blaster%5Fpiece%5Fguard%5Faccidentally%5FTe6x8kwkxu6bYWzg9wy94H?ref=hyperallergic.com)\]

Wait, what!? Some of those guards own guns and bring them to work!? Oh boy, that’ll teach me not to talk back to the overly aggressive guards. At least we know that if the Met wants to recreate artist Chris Burden’s “Shoot” (1971), they won’t have to contract out the shooter.