[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/vadim.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tItaly\u2019s culture minister has called for the resignation of the government\u2019s representative on the board of the Venice Biennale, as a growing political dispute continues to eruope over Russia\u2018s plans to reopen its pavilion at the 2026 exhibition in May.<\/p>\n
\n\tIn a statement this week, culture minister\u00a0Alessandro Giuli\u00a0said he had lost confidence in\u00a0Tamara Gregoretti, who has served on the Biennale\u2019s board since March 2024, accusing her of failing to alert the ministry to the possibility that Russia would participate. According to the ministry, Gregoretti \u201cdid not deem it necessary to announce the possible presence of the Russian Federation at the next Biennale,\u201d despite the international sensitivity of the issue.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n\tThe controversy stems from last week\u2019s announcement that Russia plans to reopen its national pavilion for the first time since 2019. The presentation, titled\u00a0The Tree Is Rooted in the Sky<\/em>, is being organized by curator Anastasia Karneeva and will feature more than 30 artists.<\/p>\n \n\tLa Biennale di Venezia defended the decision when it unveiled its list of participating artists, saying the institution rejects \u201cany form of exclusion or censorship of culture and art.\u201d The organization added that the exhibition should remain \u201ca place of dialogue, openness, and artistic freedom,\u201d even as geopolitical tensions persist.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe move has quickly drawn criticism across Europe. Earlier this week,\u00a022 European culture ministers\u00a0signed a letter urging Biennale president\u00a0Pietrangelo Buttafuoco\u00a0to reconsider Russia\u2019s participation, warning that giving the country a prominent cultural platform risks projecting an image of normalcy while the war in Ukraine continues.<\/p>\n \n\tEuropean Union officials have also weighed in. In a joint statement, EU technology commissioner\u00a0Henna Virkkunen\u00a0and culture commissioner\u00a0Glenn Micallef\u00a0warned that the Biennale\u2019s decision could put roughly\u00a0\u20ac2 million in EU funding at risk, calling the move \u201cnot compatible with the EU\u2019s collective response to Russia\u2019s aggression against Ukraine.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tPressure has also come from within the cultural sector. An online petition titled\u00a0\u201cStop the Normalisation of War Crimes Through Art\u201d\u00a0has gathered more than\u00a08,000 signatures, calling on artists and cultural workers to oppose the pavilion\u2019s return.<\/p>\n \n\tItalian media outlets report that Gregoretti has so far shown no intention of stepping down. Meanwhile, the culture ministry has asked the Biennale for urgent clarification about how the Russian pavilion will be installed and managed, particularly in relation to the current sanctions regime.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/artnews\/news\/italy-culture-minister-venice-biennale-russia-pavilion-resignation-1234777479\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/vadim.jpg?w=1024″] Italy\u2019s culture minister has called for the resignation of the government\u2019s representative on the board of the Venice Biennale, as a growing political dispute continues to eruope over Russia\u2018s plans to reopen its pavilion at the 2026 exhibition in May. In a statement this week, culture minister\u00a0Alessandro Giuli\u00a0said he had lost confidence […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-1830020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1830020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1830020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1830020\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1830020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1830020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1830020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}