THE FIRST European politician to join the project Paint Your Own Butterfly, organised by the Miro Gallery, in the eastern Slovak town of Snina, was head of the European Commission's delegation to Slovakia, Erik van der Linden.
On September 20, Van der Linden painted a pink butterfly-woman with wings, encircled in a blue ring, symbolising the sky.
"Pink is the colour of joy and cheerfulness, which women bring in general, and blue the colour around it represents airiness and flight," he told the news agency TASR.
Slovak politicians, Prime Minister Mikuláš Dzurinda, Parliamentary Deputy Speaker Pavol Rusko, and former Parliamentary Speaker Ivan Gašparovič, exhibited their 'painting skills' earlier at the Gallery.
According to the gallery's director, Miro Smolák, the project's aim is to support good relations among nations. Altogether, over 300 artists, as well as non-artists from 35 countries, have participated during the ten years of the festival. By May 2004, when the project Paint Your Own Butterfly closes, the organisers plan to aquire more paintings from Slovak and foreign politicians. They also aim at entering the Guinness Book of World Records.
