A New York woman named Holly Van Voast knows how to make people talk. She calls herself “Holly Van Toast, the topless paparazzo” and makes her living as an artist and photographer.
Between 2011 and 2013, she was arrested a handful of times for openly exposing her breasts in public. She did so while sporting a painted mustache and a blonde Marilyn Monroe wig, which she took to wearing while touring around all five boroughs of New York City.
At the end of the day, the law was on Holly’s side. A court settled the question in 1992 that women DO have a right to go topless in public in New York. Considering that that is the case, a lawyer representing Van Voast was critical of the New York police for their incompetence in the wake of that ruling.
After filing lawsuits following her technically wrongful arrests, she agreed to settle for $40,000 to avoid further publicity. Yet she feels the abuse she suffered and being forced to get psychiatric evaluations caused more pain than that amount of money could heal.
Mrs. Van Voast has had many negative reactions thrown her way. She has spent some time in Kentucky writing about her experiences in the big city.
