Odesa unveils its first pysanka monument

Local artist makes huge Easter egg from metal nuts.

One more tourist attraction appeared these days in Odesa as Ukraine's southern region unveiled its first monument to pysanka, the Ukrainian decorated Easter egg.

Unusual pysanka, made of metal nuts of different sizes, was shown to public on May 3 in the town of Kominternivske. The author is the local artist Kyrylo Maksymenko, who is famous for turning metal scrap into art objects.

"There are about two thousand [of metal nuts]. The matter was urgent, so I had to buy them, but I usually pick up parts of my future sculptures just walking across the city and its suburbs," the artist told local web site dumskaya.net

Metal pysanka is not the first art object authored by Maksymenko. In February the central street of Kominternivske was decorated with his "Heart of Love" composition. This May the sculptor promises to come up with "Head of Jacqueline Roque" – the monument to the last muse of Pablo Picasso.

The largest Easter egg in the world was constructed in  Vegreville, Canada.The Easter egg or Ukrainian 'Pysanka,' was constructed in 1975 in honour of the early Ukrainian settlements east of Edmonton. Thousands of tourists from around the world visit Vegreville annually and marvel at the Pysanka. It is one of the premier tourist attractions on the Trans Canada Yellowhead Highway. The Pysanka is really an immense jig-saw puzzle containing 524 star patterns, 3,512 facets, 2,206 equilateral triangles, 6,978 nuts and bolts, and 177 internal struts.

Pysanka museum (Easter Egg Museum) is in Kolomya (western Ukraine). About 12 000 Easter Eggs from different regions of Ukraine and the World are gathered there. Externally the museum is made in the shape of an egg and inside looks like an spacecraft or the temple.