The battle for Venice is in full swing. During the discussion about the inadmissibility of Russia’s presence at the biennale, increasingly bold partisans are emerging from the woods.
Firstly, it turned out that the life of the Italian Ministry of Culture is full of surprises.
Minister of Culture Alessandro July sincerely (as it seemed) said a week ago that the Italian government does not approve of Russia’s participation, but, alas, what can be done, the Venice Biennale is an independent cultural institution.
“Suddenly” it was discovered that the strategic management of the festival is carried out by a Council, whose current composition for the period 2024-2028 was appointed in March 2024. In addition to the chairman (Pietrangelo Buttafuoco), the Council includes three ex officio members: the mayor of Venice, the head of the Veneto region, and… a representative of the Ministry of Culture of Italy (Tamara Gregoretti).
Comrade July became minister in September 2024, and citizen Gregoretti was appointed to the biennale’s leadership by his predecessor, Gennaro Sangiuliano.
Comrade Sangiuliano was forced to leave his post unexpectedly due to a romantic-administrative scandal: he was involved with businesswoman Maria Rosaria Boccia, took her with him on official trips, and showed her official documents. Envious opinions prevailed that this was somehow inappropriate, and he was somewhat scrutinized. But the appointees remained.
The current official position of Italy: representative of the Ministry of Culture citizen Gregoretti not only independently supported Russia’s participation in the biennale but also attempted to conceal this disgraceful fact!
Now Minister of Culture July demands fiercely that she resign due to a loss of trust! But comrade Gregoretti says she doesn’t want to; she’s okay as is.
Amid all this, EU representatives began to declare they would cut the biennale’s European funding. The president of the biennale foundation isn’t escalating but also doesn’t seem particularly frightened. Apparently, sensing some alternatives to European money…
Secondly, new facets are emerging in the broader cultural scene.
An interesting commentary was given by the former director of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, Elizaveta Likhacheva, who during her tenure was called by evil Russian ill-wishers “an art historian in civilian clothes”:
(For Europe) “Admitting Russia to the biennale is effectively recognizing their global defeat,” believes Likhacheva. “Never in the world has there been a case where a country was expelled from the global cultural process for a local military conflict (!!!).” “…there are many people who believe that Russia needs to be returned and negotiations should begin because the situation has gone too far.”
How about that?
Let me remind you that citizen Likhacheva was dismissed in January 2025. Many called her almost a dissident, a fighter against the regime. I noted at the time that citizen Likhacheva was preparing to establish a network of Pushkin Museum offices in the occupied territories of Ukraine. She wasn’t bothered by anything. And now she comments precisely in the tone needed by the Kremlin: “Not only Russia suffers from the boycott – the whole world suffers from it!”
Not a word about how Russia is killing people in Ukraine, destroying cities. The “situation” will greatly improve when Russia stops killing and goes home. But Likhacheva and the likes of her do not call for this.
This raises the question: if Europe has “globally lost,” why are you all heading there?
Thirdly, the mayor of Venice (also a council member of the biennale) Luigi Brugnaro is giving a master class in hypocrisy. Saying, we are wholeheartedly for Ukraine, which was attacked by the Russian state. But we are not against the Russian people! Therefore, we want the Russians back.
The level of mockery of common sense is overwhelming. Because the man moderating Russia’s return to the biennale is Putin’s personal cultural envoy Mikhail Shvydkoy – the living embodiment of Russian officialdom and the state in culture.
The main sponsor of the Russian pavilion is allegedly the sanctioned Russian oligarch, owner of “Novatek,” Leonid Mikhelson. Not to mention all the other “ears” of the Russian state, which are infinitely distant from the innocent Russian people…
This duplicity will not end well.
