[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Padiglione-Centrale_Giardini_Photo-by-Francesco-Galli.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tAs controversy mounts over Russia\u2019s plans to mount its first Venice Biennale pavilion since the nation\u2019s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, 37 members of the European Parliament signed a letter that calls for the European Union to cease all funding to the Biennale.<\/p>\n
\n\tThe EU has not publicly stated how much money it gives to the Biennale, which is not just the top art exhibition in Europe but the biggest show of its kind anywhere in the world. But according to the letter, which was obtained by Politico<\/em> on Friday, the EU has granted around 2 million euros to the Biennale over a three-year period.<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cUnder no circumstances should Russia, a state subject to extensive European Union sanctions on trade, goods and services, be permitted to participate in an event financed by European taxpayers\u2019 money,\u201d the letter states. \u201cThe Russian pavilion must likewise not be used for any activities organised by Russia, whether in physical or digital form.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tCalling the pavilion \u201cunacceptable,\u201d the pavilion goes on to note, \u201cEvery day that Russia\u2019s pavilion remains on the programme of the Venice Biennale is a day the European Union\u2019s credibility is weakened. Every euro of EU funding that flows to an institution hosting that pavilion is a contradiction in terms. The Ukrainian people, who are fighting and dying for the values this Union was built upon, deserve better than ambiguity.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe letter calls for a formal review of the Russian Pavilion\u2019s participants and organizers, with the possibility of seeking sanctions against some individuals as a result. Moreover, the letter\u2019s signatories are asking for \u201ctargeted restrictive measures against any individuals or entities involved in the Russian pavilion who can be credibly linked to the Russian government, its propaganda apparatus, or entities supporting the war effort.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe EU has already threatened to pull funding from the Venice Biennale over the Russian Pavilion, but beyond a short statement condemning the pavilion, the EU has not said whether it has taken any action.<\/p>\n \n\tA range of individuals and national governments have also denounced the pavilion, which appears to be taking place as planned.<\/p>\n \n\tThe Biennale has said it cannot oust a nation from the exhibition and that the show is \u201ca place of dialogue, openness, and artistic freedom.\u201d Yet in 2022, when Russia launched its war in Ukraine, the exhibition explicitly commented on the conflict and took Ukraine\u2019s side, staging a dedicated Ukrainian project in the Giardini park, where many national pavilions are located. That year, Russia\u2019s artists and curators elected to close their pavilion; in 2024, Russia handed over its pavilion to Bolivia.<\/p>\n \n\tSeemingly in an effort to address the controversy, the Biennale has promised two unusual additions to the show that obliquely deal with prior protests. <\/p>\n \n\tOne is a project dedicated to Carlo Ripa di Meana, a former Biennale president who, in 1973, decided to shutter the art exhibition and instead mount a presentation about the military dictatorship in Chile. This project will involve figures who are \u201ccurrently unwelcome to their governments, from the US, Israel, China, Russia, and even the EU,\u201d according to current Biennale president Pietrangelo Buttafuoco.<\/p>\n \n\tThe second addition will be called \u201cThe Column and the Foundation of Truth\u201d and will involve programming related to Pavel Florensky, a Russian Orthodox priest who was executed by firing squad by the Soviet government in 1937.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/venice-biennale-russian-pavilion-european-meps-open-letter-1234779176\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Padiglione-Centrale_Giardini_Photo-by-Francesco-Galli.jpg?w=1024″] As controversy mounts over Russia\u2019s plans to mount its first Venice Biennale pavilion since the nation\u2019s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, 37 members of the European Parliament signed a letter that calls for the European Union to cease all funding to the Biennale. The EU has not publicly stated how much money […]<\/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-1852725","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\/1852725","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=1852725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1852725\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1852725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1852725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1852725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}