It is truly rare to see works of art on living, breathing subjects. On September 1st in Daegu, South Korea, the largest bodypainting festival worldwide was held in Duryu Park. Not only do these subjects all have beautiful paint on their figures, they frequently also had amazing costume pieces like complex dresses, crazy nails, beautiful jewelry and wildly extravagant headdresses that I can’t even begin to imagine attempting to perform in. Not only would a massive amount of technique honing, preparation and planning go into each costume, but I would guess that there were multiple people manning each model as a team in order to ensure perfection as an outcome. Though there are high-end professional body paints that are very resistant to smearing, smudging and sweating, they are not completely touch-proof and, given how intricate each costume is, every on of these pieces is a work of art, both creatively and organizationally.

Check out some of our favorite images below the cut! As many of these works of art are upon nearly nude bodies, just keep in mind that some of these may be NSFW.


So Lovelies, which of these are your favorite looks? Have any of these given you (albeit incredibly complex) Halloween costume ideas?


All photo credits: Chung Sun-Jun/Getty Images

See more of these photos at Buzzfeed.