The destruction of an artwork by Ai Weiwei has been condemned as a “reckless and senseless act” of vandalism by the exhibition’s curator.

A 57-year-old Czech man was arrested after smashing to pieces a large blue and white Porcelain Cube at Bologna’s Palazzo Fava museum on Friday, local reports said.

The exhibition’s curator Arturo Galansino called it an act of “vandalism” made worse because some of the works on display “explore the theme of destruction itself”.