In early May, Odesa becomes the venue for the annual bodyart festival that draws hundreds of models and dozens of artists, who come to show their skill in painting bodies, while others still come just to show their bodies. Bodies, big and small, naked and half naked, proved a crowd puller for city guests and foreign tourists. White-toothed grins and grimaces. Joyful faces of policemen. Where else can you see something of the kind? All you have to do is hitch a bus ride to this town, which I like more and more. Odesa has of late claimed the title of a real bodyart Mecca. The May 2 Third International Body Art Festival drew some two hundred models from across Ukraine and Russia. Ladies and their male counterparts patiently waited for their turn to be painted and then sunbathed as the paint dried. The jury selected the best creations, which were later reluctantly washed away with water, photography being the only means to immortalize all this beauty. So sit back and enjoy the shots. On seeing them, a friend of mine swore he would take his wife and son out to the balcony and fetch a pail of paint. Have you ever tried anything like this?
