A Russian air attack launched on Odessa late on Sunday 5 November has wounded eight people, hit about 20 multi-storey building and dozens of cars, and damaged the Odessa National Art Museum, one of the city’s premiere art institutions. It was the eve of the institution’s 124th anniversary, and the Russian attack hit just in front of the architectural monument, damaging the Unesco World Heritage Site.
The Odesa Museum of Fine Arts housed more than 12,000 works before the war, but nearly the whole collection was transported for safekeeping by the museum employees in February 2022. The governor of the Odesa region, Oleh Kiper, reiterated on social media that most of the collection had already been removed during the war and that ‘Canvases and paintings from the current exhibition were not damaged’. Videos show the crater just in front of the building, shattered windows and dusty, ruined exhibition halls. Seven exhibitions, most featuring the work of contemporary Ukrainian artists, were damaged.
