VENICE: Bare-breasted activists protested at the Venice Biennale on Wednesday, incensed over the return of Russia to the prestigious art festival for the first time since the Ukrainian war broke out.
The world´s largest contemporary art exhibition, which takes place every two years in the Italian canal city, has been hit by resignations, boycotts and threats to cut funding over Russia´s inclusion.
Wearing pink balaclavas, baring their breasts and setting off pink smoke bombs, Ukrainian feminist collective Femen and Russian protest punk band Pussy Riot demonstrated outside the Russian pavilion at the start of Wednesday´s press previews.
“We are here to remind that the only Russian culture, the only Russian art today is blood,” Femen activist Inna Shevchenko told reporters. “This pavilion stands on Ukrainian mass graves,” she said, adding that it was the first time the two groups had staged a joint protest.
Russia´s inclusion for the first time since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine sparked outrage from Italy´s government and the European Union, which threatened to cut two million euros ($2.3 million) in funding from the Biennale.
The Biennale jury last week resigned after saying they would not hand out awards to countries led by figures subject to arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) -- meaning Russia and Israel.
In the end, the Russian pavilion will not be open to the public during the Biennale, which runs from May 9 to November 22. Instead, musical performances for the exhibit -- “the tree is rooted in the sky” -- will be recorded during this week´s press previews and later projected on giant outdoor screens.
Biennale President Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, who has defended Russia´s inclusion, told reporters that organisers “cannot boycott as an automatic response”. “If the Biennale were to start selecting not works but affiliations, not visions but passports, it would cease to be what it has always been: the place where the world comes together, and all the more so when the world is torn apart,” he said.
Other countries involved in conflict are represented in Venice, including the United States and Israel, which attacked Iran in late February. Iran had been due to attend, but pulled out. About a hundred pro-Palestinian demonstrators gathered in front of Israel´s pavilion on Wednesday, holding up banners saying “No artwashing genocide”.
