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The Spanish parishioner who achieved global fame for her poorly executed restoration attempt on a valuable Jesus Christ fresco has passed away at the age of 94.

Cecilia Giménez, a resident of the town of Borja in northern Spain, became a global sensation thirteen years ago after she undertook to repaint a 100-year-old painting known as Ecce Homo located in her local church.

Giménez's restoration effort spread across the internet and earned the moniker "Potato Jesus", because the altered depiction of Christ's head looking somewhat like a hairy monkey.

Local Confirmation and Homage

The 94-year-old's death was confirmed by the town's mayor, Eduardo Arilla, via an online statement, where he acknowledged her as a "passionate enthusiast of painting from a young age".

"Descansa en paz Cecilia, your memory will live on with us," Arilla wrote.

Arilla also paid tribute to Giménez's "now-legendary restoration of Ecce Homo" in August 2012, which "because of the poor state of conservation it presented, Cecilia, with the best intentions, chose to repaint the work over".

The Painting's Background and the Now-Infamous Act

The Ecce Homo ("Behold the Man" in Latin) painted by nineteenth-century artist Elias Garcia Martinez had been held for more than a hundred years in the Santuario de la Misericordia near Zaragoza.

In 2012, Giménez, then 81, explained that parishioners had "traditionally fixed everything here", and that she had received permission from the local priest to do the work.

She added at the time that anyone who came into the Church would have observed she was painting over the original image.

A Surprising Economic Lifeline

The aftermath of the repaint job led to the creation of the "Ecce Mono" internet phenomenon and transformed the once quiet town of Borja rapidly turn into a significant tourist destination.

The municipality, which had in the past seen only 5,000 visitors per year, attracted over 40,000 tourists by 2013, and managed to raise more than €50,000 for charity from the interest.

Today, local authorities say that somewhere around 15,000 and 20,000 tourists travel to Borja every year to view the famous painting, which is now displayed behind a protective shield of glass.

Legacy and Community Support

Following the initial backlash, with support from local residents and others globally, Giménez later stage an exhibition of her paintings featuring twenty-eight of her own paintings.

She was praised by the mayor for her kind-hearted nature and decades of dedication to the church.

Ultimately, what began as a well-intentioned but flawed art repair created an improbable cultural icon and provided unprecedented tourist revenue to a humble Spanish town.